Angry residents of the Zimbabwe capital Harare's impoverished "high density" satellite townships began a three-day protest on October 16 against price increases for basic commodities.
The spontaneous protests, which were triggered by young people in Tafara who moved around the suburb urging workers to join a "stay-away", swelled from hundreds of participants on the first day to several thousand on October 18. The protests quickly targeted the Zimbabwe National African Congress-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) regime and President Robert Mugabe.
The protests followed 30% rises in the price of public transport fares, sugar, bread and other essential goods. Inflation and unemployment rates are above 50%. In January 1998, three days of riots convulsed Harare after similar price rises.
The riot police's efforts on October 16 to contain the outbursts that began in Mabvuku and Tafara, 30 kilometres east of Harare, by hurling tear gas canisters, firing rubber bullets, beating protesters with batons and attempting to seal off the townships only enraged people further and protests soon spread to the townships of Mbare, Mufakose, Glen View, Budiriro, Highfield and Kuwadzana. Commuter buses were torched, shops and delivery trucks looted, and barricades of burning tyres were set up.
The government mobilised the National Reaction Force of special police and military troops on October 17 as Zimbabweans protested for a second day. Troops attempted to block township dwellers from entering central Harare. Air Force helicopters buzzed the townships, firing tear gas into the crowds. At least 51 people were arrested in the first two days of the "riots", police spokesperson Wayne Bvudzijena said.
Residents complained that police and troops had fired tear gas canisters into people's homes and near schools. Bystanders were beaten without cause. Armed riot police moved from house to house forcing people out to remove street barricades, but as soon as the cops had moved on barricades were replaced.
The protests on the second day became more political, with demands for Mugabe's ouster being raised. There were chants of "Chinja! Chinja!" (Change! Change!), the slogan of the trade union-backed opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). Government vehicles were singled out and stoned.
"If Yugoslavia did it, why can't we?", one demonstrator shouted, according to a United Nations Integrated Regional Information Network reporter. "As long as we are hungry we will not stop fighting. War has began", another declared.
MDC
The leader of the MDC, Morgan Tsvangirai, denied ZANU-PF charges that his party had organised the protests. In a statement, Tsvangirai said the MDC leadership would soon meet to determine when a campaign of mass action would be called, but in the meantime the party would attempt to have parliament force Mugabe's impeachment.
Tension has been mounting recently as the ZANU-PF regime has escalated its harassment of the MDC. In a crudely handled provocation, the MDC's Harare office was bombed in September. ZANU-PF home affairs minister John Nkomo immediately announced that the attack was "an inside job" to enable the MDC to score a "propaganda coup" against the government.
However, it soon emerged that a suspect had been arrested by police soon after the bombing but released when it was discovered that he was a security police officer who had infiltrated the MDC youth wing on the government's orders. The blast was to be a pretext to allow police to search the MDC office and party leaders' homes, where they would find weapons planted by the infiltrator. This would have given the government an excuse to ban the MDC for planning an armed uprising.
However, the plan was spoiled when the agent-provocateur was mistakenly detained before he could plant the weapons. Subsequent police searches of MDC premises found no weapons.
The government threatened to arrest Tsvangirai and charge him with "incitement" under the provisions of the Rhodesian-era Law and Order Maintenance Act following a speech he made at a 20,000-strong MDC rally in Harare on September 30. The MDC leader warned that unless Mugabe stepped down as president, he risked being removed violently in a mass uprising. Tsvangirai also announced that the MDC would organise a mass action campaign to oust Mugabe.
A criminal conviction against Tsvangirai would rule out his candidature for the 2002 presidential contest. Police said they were studying Tsvangirai's speech, in which they claim he stated: "Time for national action is now. We cannot wait for [the presidential election in] 2002. Mugabe should go peacefully. If he does not, we will remove him violently."
Militant mass action
On October 9, police briefly detained three radical MDC parliamentarians in a pre-dawn raid after they had organised a meeting to discuss what the MDC's reaction should be if Tsvangirai was arrested.
A demonstration of 3000 MDC supporters was held that day in Harare to protest the MPs' arrest and the threat to arrest Tsvangirai. In the end, the three were released without charge and Tsvangirai voluntarily submitted himself for questioning on October 10; he was allowed to return home after receiving a "statement of warning" from the police.
Among the MDC MPs who were detained was Job Sikhala, who is campaigning among Harare's working class and poor for the MDC to take militant mass action. "In that parliament, we are not going to achieve anything", Sikhala told the October 13 New York Times. "The people of this country are prepared to rise against the dictatorship. We will have casualties ... but we have been frustrated enough. Politics must be taken out of that parliament building."
Other MDC MPs are not so keen but admit their supporters are running out of patience. "We old men are trying to control tempers and emotions", Fidelis Mhashu told the NYT, but even some of us old people are fed up.
"Our constituents are already saying we are wasting our time in parliament. I tell them we must wait until the election in 2002 for real change. They tell me, 'We can't wait that long' and suggest, 'Let's go to the streets'. We may not be able to ignore the high temperature among our people. But we must be careful ... there is no guarantee that we're going to be able to control our people from going on a rampage". Similar sentiments were expressed by MDC MP David Coltart, a white liberal human rights lawyer.
Anger amongst the MDC's working-class supporters was fuelled further by Mugabe's October 10 proclamation of a general amnesty for all "politically motivated" crimes committed during the February constitutional referendum and the June general elections. The decree means that the ZANU-PF thugs who killed more than 30 MDC supporters and farm workers during the June election will be allowed to escape justice.
BY NORM DIXON