Opinion / Letters
Open Letter to Motlante
17 Dec 2018 at 07:29hrs | Views
Date: 15th December 2018
Mr Kgalema Motlanthe
Chairman of The Zimbabwe Commission, On 1st August 2018 Post Election Protest Public Executions The Zimbabwe Kgalema Motlane Commission of Inquiry Republic of South Africa
Dear Commission Chairman, Mr Kgalema Motlanthe,
Re: Commission's Failure To Protect Matebeleland Gukurahundi Genocide Witnesses
This complaint letter, from the 1893 Mthwakazi (Matebeleland) Human Rights Restoration Movement (1893 MHRRM), is in response to the way the victims of Matebeleland Gukurahundi Genocide, who testified before your Commission of Inquiry on the 26th October 2018 in Bulawayo, Mthwakazi (Matebeleland) in Zimbabwe, were treated in front of your Commission. We thought it wise to deliver this letter to you via the UK RSA Embassy as you are a citizen of South Africa.
We note with grave concern that on the 26th October 2018 at Rainbow Hotel, a number of victims of the Matebeleland Gukurahundi Genocide, whom you kindly gave a greenlight to testify before your Commission of Inquiry about their Matebeleland Gukurahundi Genocide experiences, were harassed, beaten and arrested by the Zimbabwean police and possibly state agents in front of your Commission without your Commission making any efforts to protect them. These witnesses and victims of the Matebeleland Genocide were subsequently taken to custody and eventually to court for trial on trumped up charges levelled against them by the Zimbabwean state.
While the 1893 Mthwakazi Human Rights Restoration Movement appreciates your sound decision to allow the people of Matebeleland to testify before your Commission about their experiences during the Matebeleland Gukurahundi Genocide, the Movement however strongly condemns your Commission's failure to offer the surviving victim witnesses of this horrific state crime, protection, security and support from beatings, arrests, threats to their lives and that of their families and court trials on trumped up charges from the state of Zimbabwe. The Commission has a duty to institute mechanisms for protection, security and safety for witnesses who testify before it. This happens the world over. This Commission
seems to have failed to institute such mechanisms and therefore it has failed to offer protection, security and safety of those who testified before it.
That this sort of thing or shenanigans happened in front of a supposedly "Independent" Commission headed by your good self, a Commission whose duty has been to investigate the extra-ordinary public execution of protesters in Harare post the disputed Zimbabwean election of 2018, makes a mockery of the Commission itself, its work and its outcomes. This event and a series of other events that continue to unfold as court trials of Matebelaland Gukurahundi Genocide witnessesinZimbabwe,underminedandcontinuetounderminetheCommission's integrity and credibility and the credibility of its individual Commissioners and for all intents and purposes the integrity and credibility of a perceived statesman of your calibre.
In light of the foregoing or aforementioned issues, the 1893 Mthwakazi Human Rights Restoration Movement therefore calls on you Sir, as a Chair of the Commission, to make guarantees in writing to the Movement and the people of Matebeleland that the witnesses who testified before your Commission and their relatives are not going to be further harassed and harmed by the state of Zimbabwe or made to disappear. As you may well be in the know, Matebeleland, since the 1980s has been a land of "rivers of blood" of the people of Matebeleland as well as a land of unaccounted disappearances of its sons and daughters as a result of the 5th Brigade of Zimbabwe under the command of Robert Gabriel Mugabe and the current President of Zimbabwe, Emmerson Mnangagwa. Therefore this sort of treatment of the people of Matebeleland provokes the reliving of traumatic events of the Matebeleland Gukurahundi Genocide of the 80s.
The Movement also calls on you Sir, as the Chair of the Commission, to make guarantees in writing to the Movement and the people of Matebeleland that your Commission will intervene to stop, as a matter of urgency, the current and on-going persecution and victimization of witnesses who testified before your Commission by the state of Zimbabwe.
We would appreciate your attention and immediate resolution of this matter.
Yours Sincerely
The 1893 MHRRM-UK Leadership
Mr Kgalema Motlanthe
Chairman of The Zimbabwe Commission, On 1st August 2018 Post Election Protest Public Executions The Zimbabwe Kgalema Motlane Commission of Inquiry Republic of South Africa
Dear Commission Chairman, Mr Kgalema Motlanthe,
Re: Commission's Failure To Protect Matebeleland Gukurahundi Genocide Witnesses
This complaint letter, from the 1893 Mthwakazi (Matebeleland) Human Rights Restoration Movement (1893 MHRRM), is in response to the way the victims of Matebeleland Gukurahundi Genocide, who testified before your Commission of Inquiry on the 26th October 2018 in Bulawayo, Mthwakazi (Matebeleland) in Zimbabwe, were treated in front of your Commission. We thought it wise to deliver this letter to you via the UK RSA Embassy as you are a citizen of South Africa.
While the 1893 Mthwakazi Human Rights Restoration Movement appreciates your sound decision to allow the people of Matebeleland to testify before your Commission about their experiences during the Matebeleland Gukurahundi Genocide, the Movement however strongly condemns your Commission's failure to offer the surviving victim witnesses of this horrific state crime, protection, security and support from beatings, arrests, threats to their lives and that of their families and court trials on trumped up charges from the state of Zimbabwe. The Commission has a duty to institute mechanisms for protection, security and safety for witnesses who testify before it. This happens the world over. This Commission
seems to have failed to institute such mechanisms and therefore it has failed to offer protection, security and safety of those who testified before it.
That this sort of thing or shenanigans happened in front of a supposedly "Independent" Commission headed by your good self, a Commission whose duty has been to investigate the extra-ordinary public execution of protesters in Harare post the disputed Zimbabwean election of 2018, makes a mockery of the Commission itself, its work and its outcomes. This event and a series of other events that continue to unfold as court trials of Matebelaland Gukurahundi Genocide witnessesinZimbabwe,underminedandcontinuetounderminetheCommission's integrity and credibility and the credibility of its individual Commissioners and for all intents and purposes the integrity and credibility of a perceived statesman of your calibre.
In light of the foregoing or aforementioned issues, the 1893 Mthwakazi Human Rights Restoration Movement therefore calls on you Sir, as a Chair of the Commission, to make guarantees in writing to the Movement and the people of Matebeleland that the witnesses who testified before your Commission and their relatives are not going to be further harassed and harmed by the state of Zimbabwe or made to disappear. As you may well be in the know, Matebeleland, since the 1980s has been a land of "rivers of blood" of the people of Matebeleland as well as a land of unaccounted disappearances of its sons and daughters as a result of the 5th Brigade of Zimbabwe under the command of Robert Gabriel Mugabe and the current President of Zimbabwe, Emmerson Mnangagwa. Therefore this sort of treatment of the people of Matebeleland provokes the reliving of traumatic events of the Matebeleland Gukurahundi Genocide of the 80s.
The Movement also calls on you Sir, as the Chair of the Commission, to make guarantees in writing to the Movement and the people of Matebeleland that your Commission will intervene to stop, as a matter of urgency, the current and on-going persecution and victimization of witnesses who testified before your Commission by the state of Zimbabwe.
We would appreciate your attention and immediate resolution of this matter.
Yours Sincerely
The 1893 MHRRM-UK Leadership
Source - The 1893 MHRRM-UK Leadership
All articles and letters published on Bulawayo24 have been independently written by members of Bulawayo24's community. The views of users published on Bulawayo24 are therefore their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Bulawayo24. Bulawayo24 editors also reserve the right to edit or delete any and all comments received.
