Category: News Feeds

The MDC stands firmly by the side of Chief Ndiweni and the people of Ntabazinduna against the unjust attack and intimidation by the rogue regime.

New footage has emerged of what appears to be yet another attempt on the life of a cigarette industry boss, following a hit on Gold Leaf Tobacco Corporation’s Simon Rudland this week.

Rudland survived after being shot three times by a gunman as he was arriving for a meeting at the Fair Trade Independent Tobacco Association (FITA) offices in Oaklands, Johannesburg on Wednesday morning.

The shooter opened fire as Rudland pulled into the driveway in his Porsche Boxster. He managed to drive himself to hospital and is recovering.

FITA has decided to release footage of a separate incident targeting controversial businessman Adriano Mazzotti in June. Mazzotti is the director of cigarette company Carnilinx, which is also a member of FITA.

There have also allegedly been death threats against Amalgamated Tobacco Manufacturers (ATM) bosses Yusuf Kajee and Paul de Robillard.

FITA’s chairperson Sinenhlanhla Mnguni says they believe they are dealing with something more sinister than they first thought.

“FITA decided not to release the footage of this incident at the time as we thought it was just a random criminal act, similar to those experienced by many South Africans on a day to day basis. But after the Rudland shooting, and death threats to FITA member Yusuf Kajee and his business partner, it is clear that FITA members are being targeted by far more sinister forces.

“For that reason, FITA members have now agreed to release the footage of this attack on one of our members. We feel it is in the public interest and we’re calling for information from the public at large in relation to these incidents clearly meant to intimidate our members. We are also calling on law enforcement agencies to intervene and protect FITA members from these criminal elements,” says Mnguni.

Mazzotti: ‘Similarities are sinister’

The latest released CCTV footage captures an incident which occurred on June 22, when Mazzotti was visiting his 88-year-old mother at his sister’s house in Illovo.

The video shows Mazzotti being ambushed by gunmen in a white VW Golf. He rams his vehicle into the Golf and the suspects flee. Initially, he thought it was a random hijacking attempt but has since changed his mind. The shooters in the attack on Rudland were also in a white VW Golf.

“The similarities are sinister and obvious, I thought it was random until the Simon incident. It was a quiet Saturday morning and I picked up on what was happening, and as they stopped behind me and I saw the firearms being pointed at me, I put the car in reverse and slammed into them twice.

“The guy closest to me got a bit crushed, I think, and the guys getting out the car on the other side got knocked off their feet. One of them ran to my window and pointed a firearm at me, but he looked in shock and seemed to be trying to pull the trigger and shouted ‘Move your car!’

“The whole thing was over in seconds,” says Mazzotti.

The tobacco baron is no stranger to controversy. Earlier this year, SARS obtained a High Court warrant to attach his movable property to the value of just over R33m, to pay his company’s debt to the tax man.

He’s accused of smuggling cigarettes and SARS claims he owes over R70m in VAT and excise duties. He has also been linked to funding political parties like the EFF, and the NDZ 2017 campaign for the ANC presidency.

FITA members targeted?

Commenting after the failed attempt on his life this week, Simon Rudland pointed the finger at his colleagues within FITA.

“I’m 100% sure it’s one of the [FITA] members. It’s such a cowardly act that they can’t confront me directly. My belief, and it’s only speculation, the coincidences of what has happened are going through my mind. With Gold Leaf being the biggest competitor, they have to protect their share of the market,” said the Zimbabwean national.

But FITA’s Mnguni insists the threat is coming from outside the organisation.

“We have discussed with Mr Rudland the issue of comments attributed to him in the media regarding the incident on 14 August 2019. He is rightfully upset given the circumstances, but we have cautioned him against making bold public statements at such an early stage in the investigations into the shooting incident.

“Rudland expressed that he simply wants whoever is responsible for the cowardly act perpetrated against him and his attorney to meet the full might of the law. In this regard, we give Mr Rudland our full support and backing collectively as an organisation.

“At this stage, we have decided to allow the police to conduct their investigations in relation to the aforementioned incident. We want whoever is responsible for this senseless and evil act to be apprehended and prosecuted swiftly,” says Mnguni.

Tensions have long been simmering between the smaller independent tobacco producers and the so-called “big boys”, the major producers who are affiliated with the Tobacco Institute of South Africa (TISA).

These heightened tensions have also been exacerbated by the recent release of a tell-all book about the clandestine black ops and violence associated with the industry, written by former tax sleuth, Johann van Loggerenberg. In Tobacco Wars, Van Loggerenberg details the dirty tricks, espionage and threats allegedly employed by FSS, the private security arm of TISA.

Post published in: Featured

We understand that today’s planned protests in Harare have just been called off by the organisers, following a High Court decision to uphold a Government ban. The crowds that had already gathered were dispersed by police, with reports emerging of the use of force against protestors.

With opposition demonstrations still likely to take place in Zimbabwe in the near future, we urge the Government to find ways to continuously engage with the population about their legitimate grievances on the economic situation, and to stop cracking down on peaceful protestors. If demonstrations go ahead we urge the security forces and protesters to ensure they proceed calmly and without any violence.

We are deeply concerned by the socio-economic crisis that continues to unfold in Zimbabwe. While acknowledging efforts made by the Government, the international community and the UN in Zimbabwe to mitigate the effects of the crisis and reform process, the dire economic situation is now impacting negatively on the realization of the economic and social rights of millions of Zimbabweans.

Long-term neglect and structural deficiencies have contributed to hyperinflation, resulting in soaring prices for fuel, food, transport and health services, which is having a dramatic impact on the population, and particularly on marginalized working-class people. The fact that key commodities and services have become less affordable for poor families, means there is an increasing need for strong social protection measures.

The economic crisis is converging with the impact of cyclone Idai that hit Zimbabwe last March, as well as the El Niño-induced drought, to create a rapidly deteriorating humanitarian situation, with the result that around five million Zimbabweans, or one third of the total population of 16 million people, are now estimated to be in need of humanitarian aid.

Ahead of today’s planned protest, which was called off at the last minute, there were worrying reports of threats against citizens who wish to exercise their right to express their opinions of the economic situation via peaceful protests, with allegations of increased surveillance of, and threats against, civil society organizations by State agents.

More disturbing still, there have been reports of actual physical attacks on, and arrests and detention of, civil society leaders and activists over the past few months, with one human rights defender and one political activist reportedly temporarily abducted and severely beaten by unidentified armed men a few days ago, apparently because of their role in helping to organize the protests today. In the last few hours, we have heard reports of more such cases and are looking into them. Senior officials have also reportedly issued threats against organisers of demonstrations or against people who take part in them.

State authorities have a duty to ensure people’s rights to freedom of expression, and to facilitate and protect the right to peaceful assembly. In addition, we urge the Senate when reviewing the Maintenance of Peace and Order Bill to protect the essential democratic freedoms of peaceful assembly and demonstration by ensuring the Bill’s compliance with the Constitution, decisions of the Constitutional Court, and international human rights standards.

In January, we expressed concerns about reports of excessive use of force, including live ammunition, by Zimbabwean security forces during protests following the announcement of an increase in petrol prices. We are not aware of the indictment or prosecution of a single alleged perpetrator of human rights violations committed during or after of those protests. The Government does not appear to have carried out the requisite investigations into the violence, including the alleged excessive use of force by security forces, in a prompt, thorough and transparent manner, with a view to accountability, and we urge it to do so without further delay.

We also urge the Government to redouble its efforts to address the current challenges through a national dialogue, with the support of the international community, and to ensure that civil society organizations, human rights defenders, and activists can carry out their activities in a safe and secure environment without fearing intimidation or reprisals for their work.

Post published in: Featured

In an exclusive interview with Bloomberg News on Thursday, Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube dismissed rapidly accelerating inflation as “wage compression” and warned the country will have to endure four more months of economic pain. On Friday morning, police in the capital violently dispersed demonstrators protesting over the hardship his austerity measures have spawned.

“The big macro-economic decisions should be complete by year-end,” Ncube, 55, said in an interview at his office in central Harare. “In December, everything stops in terms of the big decisions. Beyond that, we focus more on jobs, growth, productivity and development.”

Almost a year into the job, Ncube, a Cambridge-university trained economics professor, has reined in state spending and boosted tax revenue. But his introduction of a new currency in June, accompanied by a ban on the use of the dollar, has seen the rapid erosion of spending power with the Zimbabwe dollar trading at almost 10 to the dollar. Its predecessor, a quasi-currency known as bond notes, was officially said to be at parity as recently as February.

Extreme poverty

Now many of the country’s 400 000 civil servants, who form the bulk of the middle class, are earning less than the $1.90 a day, defined by the World Bank as the line below which people are living in extreme poverty.

Zimbabwe’s annual inflation, the release of which has been suspended for six months, is officially 176% and shortages of fuel and bread are widespread. The government’s inability to pay for adequate electricity imports has crippled the economy with power outages of as long as 18 hours a day. The measures, which Ncube conceded were painful for citizens, are necessary if the country is to regain a sound economic footing, he said.

There’s a growing risk that the economic hardship may trigger unrest similar to violence that took place two decades ago, said Japhet Moyo, the head of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions, the biggest labour federation.

“We will experience the 1999 scenario, which had no co-ordinator and riots broke out spontaneously,” Moyo said in an interview.

At least one person was injured when police charged a group of protesters in Harare’s city centre, leaving a woman lying motionless on the street before she was taken to hospital by Red Cross personnel. More demonstrations are planned next week in major cities including Bulawayo, Mutare and Gweru.

While Ncube has won praise for imposing financial discipline on a notoriously profligate government, his comments on inflation strained the credulity of some analysts.Ncube said annual inflation data showed that wages haven’t adjusted quickly enough to the new exchange rate, and not that the country is heading for hyperinflation.

‘Economic gobbledygook’

“What people are feeling is really wage compression,” he said. “Prices adjusted instantly to the exchange rate, but wages have been too slow to catch up with the adjustment. The issue is about wage adjustment and I’m a big champion of wage adjustment.”

The finance minister is talking “economic gobbledygook,” said Steve H. Hanke, a professor of applied economics at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. “By my measure, Zimbabwe’s inflation is the second highest in the world at 570%.” Venezuela has the world’s highest inflation.

Ncube planned reforms include establishing a nine-member Monetary Policy Committee that will reduce interest rates from 50%. Within 12 to 18 months, the nation plans to sell domestic bonds with a duration of as long as 30 years to fund infrastructure. In time, it will approach international markets, he said.

The reforms are aimed at restructuring the country’s $9 billion of external loans. Under a debt settlement plan, which Ncube said he’s discussing with creditors, Zimbabwe would complete an International Monetary Fund Staff-Monitored Program in January. It would then:

Borrow the $1.9bn it owes the World Bank and the African Development Bank from the Group of Seven industrialized nations immediately win $1bn in relief from the two lenders, which would be paid back to the G7 creditors

Expect so-called Paris Club creditors, to whom it owes $3.8bn in bilateral debt, to take a “haircut. “IMF Resident Representative Patrick Imam said conditions are not yet in place for the fund to provide financial support for Zimbabwe. The IMF’s SMP is being used to support economic and governance reforms in the country.

“Zimbabwe needs to build a track record to prove that it can implement reforms to tackle deep-rooted problems, as the hurdle rate for a financially supported program is high,” Imam said. Even Ncube’s supporters say that if his measures work, there is a lot more hardship in store for Zimbabweans.

“This situation is something which can persist for anything between three to five years of pain,” said Lloyd Mlotshwa, head of equities at IH Securities in Zimbabwe, who praised the finance minister for raising fuel and power prices that were previously subsidized by the government. “What can shorten this period is if there are funds poured in to the plug the gap.”

Post published in: Business

Pride presented himself to the police on 15 August 2019 after the police requested to interview him. He was accompanied by his lawyers from the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights who are representing him.

Mkono joins a list of 22 civil society leaders and human rights defenders and opposition leaders who have been charged with subversion since the beginning of the year. Apart from his arrest, following yesterday’s protest, police arrested over 80 citizens in Bulawayo, Chitungwiza and Harare on allegations of committing public violence.

Medical facilities are also attending to more than 20 cases of people who were brutally assaulted by police including a journalist who was covering yesterday’s peaceful protests. The injured include women and children.

Meanwhile, the government-owned Herald has made sensational allegations that civil society leaders who were attending the SADC People’s Summit in Tanzania are planning to demonstrate against President Mnangagwa and are being trained to commit acts of banditry. The state has gone on to publish over 20 names of civil society leaders that they claim are planning to smear the image of the country. See: https://www.herald.co.zw/civic-society-plots-to-smear-zim-at-sadc/

The SADC People’s Summit is an annual platform where over 2000 citizens from the SADC region converge to share notes on developments in the region and develop a set of recommendations to the regional body and heads of states from member states.

In May, Zimbabwean authorities arrested 7 civil society leaders upon their arrival from Maldives and charged them with subversion despite the absence of evidence that shows that they were trained in banditry. Between January and February 2019, the state arrested labour leaders and CSOs leaders including the CiZC Chairperson Rashid Mahiya on allegations of attempting to subvert a constitutionally elected government.

Increasingly CSOs have complained that the Mnangagwa administration is closing democratic space by continuously persecuting civil society leaders and human rights defenders.

More details to follow….

Post published in: Featured

Riot police in Zimbabwe on Friday fired teargas and beat demonstrators who defied a protest ban, as the opposition accused President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government of surpassing Robert Mugabe’s regime in brutality.

Scores of people gathered in a square in the capital Harare to demonstrate against the country’s worsening economy, despite massive police deployment and a ban upheld by a court the same morning.

Police cornered a group of protesters and beat them with batons, an AFP reporter saw.

One woman was seen being carried into a Red Cross ambulance.

The protesters then regrouped, singing songs condemning police brutality. As the crowd swelled, police fired teargas.

“People were just singing… peacefully. Then they saw the police coming — they were encircling people, they were actually surrounding the supporters then they came closer to us and started beating people,” a 35-year-old protester who gave her name as Achise told AFP.

She said police beat “an old woman”.

“This is worse than during colonial times,” said a man who declined to be identified.

“We aren’t armed but the police just beat us while we were sitting on the street”.

Police said in a statement they had arrested 91 people for various offences, but rights groups said there had been 128 arrests.

Dozens of police and water cannons were deployed in running battles with protesters, many of them from the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

The protest took place in Africa Unity Square, overlooking the Zimbabwean parliament, where crowds gathered in November 2017 to demand Mugabe, the country’s long-time autocratic ruler, step down.

MDC leader Nelson Chamisa slammed the “brutal” clampdown as even worse than during Mugabe’s era.

“We not only have an illegitimate regime in this country, we have a rogue regime,” Chamisa said. Seven people suffered serious injuries, including a woman, he said.

“What is clear is that it’s turning out that the regime in Harare is far worse than the Mugabe regime. One would be persuaded to think that Mugabe is back, but then you realise this — it’s not Mugabe even at his best.

“Mugabe had become a toddler when it comes to the kind of brutality that we are seeing… in terms of just the magnitude of abuse and heavy handedness.”

Friday’s protests went ahead after MDC plans for large-scale marches were banned by police late on Thursday.

An MDC attempt to challenge the ban in court was then rejected.

The party’s vice president, Tendai Biti, told reporters outside the High Court: “The fascist regime has denied the right for Zimbabweans to demonstrate”.

“There is no difference between Mnangagwa and Mugabe. We jumped from the frying pan into the fire after the November coup,” he said.

Supported by the military, Mnangagwa took over from Mugabe before winning disputed elections in July 2018.

He vowed to revive Zimbabwe’s sickly economy. But many Zimbabweans say the situation has worsened, with shortages of basic goods and skyrocketing prices.

Around five million people — almost a third of the country’s 16 million population — are in need of aid and at least half of them are on the cusp of “starvation”, the World Food Programme (WFP) warned this month.

The government, through the information ministry’s Twitter account, described Friday’s violence as “a few skirmishes.”

“Normalcy has returned to Harare,” it added.

Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum, a coalition of 21 human rights groups, on Thursday said six opposition and rights activists had been abducted and tortured by unidentified assailants ahead of the demonstration. Chamisa said the number had grown to 18.

Chamisa vowed to push on with more protests.

“What you are seeing is just but a teaser, this is an introduction, we are going to be on the streets until the state responds,” he said.

“This is a long winter of discontent, a long winter of expression of ourselves. It’s not going to be a walk in the park, it’s not going to be instant coffee.”

Friday’s protests are the first since rallies in January against Mnangagwa’s decision to hike fuel prices that ended in deadly clashes with troops.

At least 17 people were killed and scores wounded after the army used force, including live ammunition, to crush the demonstrations.

Amnesty International condemned Friday’s attacks saying they “demonstrate just how far the authorities will go to repress dissent”.

The British embassy in Harare said it was “concerned at the images of the heavy-handed response to disperse crowds in Harare”.

JOHANNESBURG – Movement for Democratic Change president, Nelson Chamisa, has stressed their anti-government struggle is legitimate.

He says the party’s end goal is to overcome the political crisis in Zimbabwe and challenge Zimbabwean President, Emmerson Mnangagwa and his government.

Chamisa is callling police brutality in the country an international embarrassment.

The MDC called off a planned shutdown of Harare on Friday after it failed to overturn a police ban on protest action.

Friday’s demonstrations would have been the first in a series of MDC-planned rallies.

Police fired teargas and violently removed the large group gathered in the capital.

The MDC has reported the arrest of over 60 people following the illegal protests.

SADC Executive Secretary
SADC House
Plot No. 54385
Central Business District
Private Bag 0095
Gaborone, Botswana

Sent via email and facsimile

Dear Dr. Tax,

I write to you from the Committee to Protect Journalists, an independent non-profit organization that advocates for press freedom worldwide, ahead of the 39th Ordinary Summit to urge you to prioritize press freedom and the safety of journalists within the Southern African Development Community (SADC).

The SADC treaty commits member states to the principles of human rights, democracy, and the rule of law. In addition, the SADC Protocol on Culture, Information and Sport provides that member states should “take necessary measures to ensure the development of media that are editorially independent.” Despite these commitments, CPJ has documented a deeply troubling erosion of press freedom in several member states, including attacks on individual journalists, media suspensions, internet shutdowns, and restrictive legislation.

Many of these threats intensify ahead of and during elections. More than half of the SADC member states are expected to hold local and national elections by the end of 2020. SADC’s principles and guidelines for democratic elections require governments to “foster transparency, freedom of the media” and “access to information by all citizens.” Therefore, member states must ensure a free press so that journalists can work freely and safely, and citizens can access reliable information and make informed decisions.

Here is a summary of our priority issues within the region:

Attacks on journalists

We are particularly concerned with Tanzania, whose president, John Magufuli, is the incoming chair of the SADC, and where journalists operate in a very hostile environment. Freelance journalist Azory Gwanda has been missing since 2017, and the government’s failure to provide accountability in his case has had a chilling effect on the local media. Just last month, Erick Kabendera was arrested and charged with economic crimes in retaliation for his critical journalism. He remains behind bars.

However, attacks on journalists in the region extend beyond Tanzania:

• In the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), journalists have endured assaults and arrests, especially while covering protests and elections or reporting on powerful individuals.
• In Zambia, journalist Derrick Sinjela is serving 18 months in prison for contempt of court in connection with his reporting on the country’s Supreme Court.
• In Mozambique, journalist Amade Abubacar remains in legal limbo after his arrest in January; he spent 108 days in pre-trial detention in connection with his reporting on the insurgency in Cabo Delgado before he was provisionally released, and has yet to hear whether he will be formally indicted despite his pre-trial investigation concluding in July.
• In Lesotho, a military spokesperson in late 2018 threatened an investigative journalist for articles she wrote on demands for compensation by soldiers.
• During the South African elections in May, journalists faced online harassment and cyber-bullying.
• In the run-up to the Comorian elections in March, and in the crisis that followed, journalists were arrested and newspapers were censored.

Media suspensions and shutdowns

In Tanzania and Zambia, authorities have used media suspensions to pull critical media outlets from the newsstands and the airwaves. During elections in late December 2018, authorities in the DRC blocked the signals of at least two broadcasters. Partial and complete internet shutdowns in the DRC and in Zimbabwe have strangled the flow of information during politically tense periods.

Restrictive legislation

Criminal defamation, sedition, and secrecy laws—many of them vestiges of the colonial and apartheid eras—have been used to target critical journalists and media outlets in Namibia, Zambia, Botswana, and the DRC. Zimbabwe and Lesotho  have recently struck down criminal defamation laws and we urge member states to follow this example. Through new regulations, Tanzania has also set impossibly high barriers for bloggers to operate while seeking greater control of what citizens can say online.

These are difficult but not intractable challenges. In fact, SADC member states have been catalysts for the development of press freedom in Africa, and around the world. Consider that May 3, the date of the 1991 Declaration of Windhoek—in which African journalists affirmed that the “free press is essential to the development and maintenance of democracy in a nation, and for economic development”—later became the day on which the global media community commemorates World Press Freedom Day.

Press freedom is essential to ensuring sustainable development, peace, and the enjoyment of human rights, and the SADC can and should be at the forefront of protecting and promoting press freedom in Africa and the world. But in order to do so, it must hold its member states to account on press freedom violations. The 39thOrdinary Summit of Heads of State and Government is a prime opportunity for SADC members to raise the issues CPJ has documented with relevant states. We urge SADC member states at the Summit to recommit to press freedom, and call for the release of all imprisoned journalists and the protection of free and independent media in the region.

CPJ would welcome an opportunity to discuss this further with the SADC secretariat, as well as representatives of member states.

Sincerely,

Robert Mahoney
Deputy Executive Director
Committee to Protect Journalists

CC:

Angola, President João Lourenço
Botswana, President Mokgweetsi Masisi
Comoros, President Azali Assoumani
Democratic Republic of the Congo, President Félix-Antoine Tshisekedi
Eswatini, Prime Minister Ambrose Dlamini
Lesotho, Prime Minister Tom Thabane
Madagascar, President Andry Rajoelina
Malawi, President Peter Mutharika
Mauritius, Prime Minister Pravind Kumar Jugnauth
Mozambique, President Filipe Nyusi
Namibia, President Hage Geingob
Seychelles, President Danny Faure
South Africa, President Cyril Ramaphosa
Tanzania, President John Magufuli
Zambia, President Edgar Lungu
Zimbabwe, President Emmerson Mnangagwa

Post published in: Featured

Police combed Harare’s streets rounding up suspected Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) supporters, after using batons and water cannon to break up a protest that authorities had declared illegal.

Nelson Chamisa, the MDC leader who disputes president Emmerson Mnangagwa’s election win last year and accuses him of being as repressive as predecessor Robert Mugabe, said his party had followed the law but authorities responded in bad faith.

“Today, we didn’t want to risk people’s lives by continuing to be confrontational because if we had chosen to be confrontational there will be blood in the streets,” Mr Chamisa told reporters in Harare.

“We will continue to mobilise but what you are going to see is a mutation of our strategy because when you are facing a confrontational regime you must also use tactics that are going to be above them,” he said, without elaborating.

Friday’s street demonstration was to have been the first in a nationwide series of MDC-organised protests.

The party accuses Mr Mnangagwa’s government of state-sponsored violence, corruption and economic mismanagement.

It was banned on Thursday by police, but more than 100 MDC supporters defied that before being chased by baton-wielding officers from a city square.

Police patrolled the usually bustling city centre in lorries and on foot, witnesses said, firing tear gas to disperse any groups that attempted to gather as most shops and business shut.

Police also directed tear gas at journalists.

Mr Chamisa said more than 80 people had been arrested.

A police spokesman said he would give an update later.

Court appeal

The MDC called the protest off early on Friday after armed police barred access to the party’s Harare offices and its court appeal against the ban failed.

“We have jumped from the frying pan into the fire after the [anti-Mugabe] coup of November 2017 . . . We don’t accept the conduct of this regime, the conduct of Mr Mnangagwa.”

Members of the Zimbabwe Republic Police block the road to contain the planned Movement For Democratic Change Alliance Peace March in Harare. Photograph: Aaron Ufumeli/EPA

In Geneva, a spokesman for the UN human rights commissioner urged the government to engage with citizens on legitimate economic grievances and “stop cracking down on peaceful protesters”.

The demonstrations are viewed as a test of Mr Mnangagwa’s ability to tolerate dissent in a country tainted by a long history of repression. So far this year he has failed to make good on promises of political and economic reform.

Elected after the armed forces intervened to oust Mr Mugabe, Mr Mnangagwa has said he aims to break with the brutal legacy that characterised much of his predecessor’s 37 years in power.

But the economy is mired in its worst crisis in a decade, and Mr Mnangagwa is struggling to convince the growing ranks of poor that austerity measures and reforms can trigger a recovery.

Zimbabweans had also expected last year’s vote to usher in a new dawn of expanded rights and an end to the country’s international pariah status, but the elections instead left society more polarised.

In January, a crackdown in Harare against fuel demonstrations left more than a dozen people dead.

Before Friday’s planned demonstration, six political activists were abducted from their homes at night and beaten by armed men, rights groups said.

In another echo of the Mugabe era, the apparatus of state was out in full force on Friday. Witnesses saw police and armed soldiers searching buses, taxis and private vehicles at checkpoints and randomly asking for identity documents.

One woman was taken to hospital with a deep gash on her head after police charged at MDC supporters.

Anger is mounting over triple-digit inflation, rolling power cuts and shortages of US dollars, fuel and bread – bringing back memories of the hyperinflation of a decade ago that forced Zimbabwe to ditch its currency.

“We are tired, enough is enough,” MDC member Patience Gurure said moments before police dispersed her group.

In a letter to church leaders published on Friday in the state-owned Herald newspaper, Mr Mnangagwa said the economic hardship had its roots in sanctions imposed by the West more than a decade ago as well as a drought this year.

He also said Mr Chamisa rejected his invitation to talks. The MDC leader has said he will only sit down if there is a neutral arbiter.

“The doors of national dialogue are still open to all political leaders,” Mr Mnangagwa said. – Reuters