Harare – Zimbabwe’s main opposition group claimed on Friday that its supporters have been attacked ahead of next year’s national vote, as rights groups warn of a worsening crackdown on dissent.
Nelson Chamisa, who leads the opposition Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC), said political gatherings in four rural areas could not be held this week after would-be attendees were beaten up and their vehicles damaged.
“There is unprecedented violence – terror has become a daily dose,” he told a press conference in the capital, Harare.
“People in those communities are not allowed to freely associate”.
A police spokesperson said they were “yet to receive any reports” on the alleged violence and would be “following up later.”
The CCC is an offshoot of the Movement for Democratic Change Alliance party, which lost by a tight margin against the long-ruling ZANU-PF party in Zimbabwe’s 2018 general elections.
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Zanu-PF representatives could not immediately be reached by phone to comment on Chamisa’s allegations.
The CCC, formed in January this year, won two-thirds of seats up for grabs in parliamentary and municipal by-elections in March.
This raised hopes among the party’s leadership that it could secure nationwide victory in general elections, likely to be held in the first half of 2023.
There is rising discontent in Zimbabwe as President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who replaced long-time ruler Robert Mugabe in 2017, struggles to ease entrenched poverty, end the country’s chronic power cuts, and rein in inflation – which reached more than 280 percent in August.
Rights groups have complained of repeated arbitrary detentions and often exceptionally harsh custody under Mnangagwa’s rule.
No opposition party has won an election and formed a government in the former British colony since independence in 1980.
Chamisa, who is carrying out a rural outreach drive in preparation for the vote, accused the government of coordinating a campaign of violence against his supporters.
“We have government ministers who are behaving like little thugs… they literally incite violence, coordinate violence and sponsor violence,” he said.
“What we would want is to insist on peace.”
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Source: AFP
Picture: Twitter/@Laque_davis
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