OSISA - Human Rights & Democracy Building

Human Rights and Democracy Building (HRDB) overview

Wed, 18 Jan 2006 02:25:09 -0500

The Human Rights & Democracy Building programme encompasses the following six areas:

Human Rights Monitoring & Advocacy
Action Research, Civic education & Training
Equality, Equity & Non-Discrimination
Political Participation
Legal Development & Litigation
Public Service & Accountability

HRDB programme guidelines

Tue, 17 Jan 2006 09:03:38 -0500

GUIDING PRINCIPLES

OSISA will seek to support interventions that -

Ensure that there is, in each of the countries of the region, an effective mechanism and organization for monitoring human rights law and practice, publicizing violations and actioning protest work against human rights violations.
Promote a focus on the rights of women, and of children.
Contribute to effective human rights promotion and defence, including ensuring that citizens actively participate in civic formations and group interest coalitions that enable them to promote and protect their rights, and to prevent violation thereof.

OSISA will also support advocacy efforts and social action that will help build more plural and participatory electoral systems, greater civic awareness of and interest in local governance, and eliminate corruption in the national government, corporate and civic arenas.

MDC: no "run-off" amidst violence

Fri, 09 May 2008 12:26:41 -0400

Zimbabwe opposition rejects presidential run-off
Reuters Africa 9/5/2008
HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe's opposition MDC will not participate in a presidential run-off against Robert Mugabe, a top party official said on Thursday, after reports of escalating violence deepened a post-election crisis ... "Our official position still remains the same that we are not participating," MDC Secretary General Tendai Biti told reporters in Cape Town ... President Thabo Mbeki, who has been a primary regional mediator in Zimbabwe, will travel to Harare on Friday to meet political leaders. "During his visit President Mbeki is expected to interact with the Zimbabwean political leadership," said Ronnie Mamoepa ... Mbeki, who has faced a barrage of criticism for not taking a tough line with Mugabe, had said there was no crisis in his southern African neighbour. Tsvangirai has said Mbeki was no longer fit to mediate in Zimbabwe ... "We have had security agents going out to the farms, addressing the farm workers," Gertrude Hambira, general secretary of the General Agriculture and Plantation Workers' Union of Zimbabwe , told a news conference in Johannesburg. "Some of them saying that we need to discipline you because you voted for the opposition," she said adding, 400 workers were in hiding and three were in hospital after being assaulted ... Police on Thursday arrested the leaders of the country's main trade union over speeches they made during a workers' day rally last week, their lawyer said. Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) President Lovemore Matombo and Secretary-General Wellington Chibebe, who are critical of Mugabe, were taken into custody after surrendering to police ... Police have also arrested the editor of a privately owned weekly that is critical of the president ... Biti called for reconciliation and said any future government should include all parties, except for Mugabe ...

Zimbabwe arms shipment still at large

Fri, 09 May 2008 12:05:10 -0400

Arms ship heads for Congo

The Times 8/5/2008
The cargo of Chinese arms destined for Zimbabwe is now heading for Congo Brazzaville, according the South African Transport and Allied Workers’ Union, where the union believes a further attempt will be made to unload the weapons ... The Durban-based inspectorate of the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF), which has been monitoring the cargo ship Au Yue Jiang, is itself flying to Brazzaville to make sure that the weapons are not off-loaded there. A Satawu statement issued today said that the union could confirm that the ship docked in the port of Lobito in Angola and off-loaded building materials only ... Satawu said it condemned the Chinese government and the ship owners China Ocean Shipping Company (Cosco) for creating a false impression around the world that they had recalled the vessel. "This so-called recall was clearly only intended to deceive and remove the massive groundswell of political pressure ... "Both the Chinese government and Cosco have regrettably demonstrated that profiteering remains the overriding consideration over human solidarity and saving lives ... Satawu again called on all African governments and dock workers to refuse the vessel docking access and to refuse to handle the weapons with a view to ensuring that the vessel leaves African shores immediately ...

Malawian parliament suspended

Fri, 09 May 2008 08:41:19 -0400

Malawi suspends parliament as government, opposition meet
Reuters Africa 9/5/2008

LILONGWE (Reuters) - Malawi's parliament has been suspended while the government and opposition hold talks to avert a political crisis that threatens to derail international donor programmes, senior officials said on Friday. "Parliament has not met for three days now because of the talks and I have been asked to adjourn until next week," parliament speaker Louis Chimango told Reuters ... Chimango has come under pressure to resign for not expelling more than 70 MPs who defected to the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). The United Democratic Front (UDF) and Malawi Congress Party (MCP), which together form a majority in parliament, want to remove the defecting DPP lawmakers under a constitutional provision that bans parliamentarians from switching parties. Chimango's refusal to remove the MPs for three years has led to political uncertainty. The latest dispute may delay debate of the 2008/2009 budget ... The UDF representative at the talks, George Ntafu, said that unless the government agreed to implement the provision banning party defections, the talks would fail. If the ban takes effect, the opposition would have the two-thirds majority needed to impeach wa Mutharika, but opposition leaders say they do not plan to seek his removal ...

A Glossary of oppression in Zimbabwe

Fri, 09 May 2008 07:06:05 -0400

ZIMBABWE: Operation Glossary - a guide to Zimbabwe's internal campaigns
IRIN News 9/5/2008
JOHANNESBURG, 1 May 2008 (IRIN) - The Lancaster House Agreement in December 1979 paved the way for Zimbabwe's independence in April 1980. President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF government has been at the helm since the former British colony gained independence, and has increasingly used military-style campaigns to impose measures ranging from acts of alleged genocide to attempts to rein in hyperinflation ... Operation Mavhoterapapi was launched after the local government, parliamentary and presidential elections on 29 March 2008, in which the ruling ZANU-PF government lost its parliamentary majority for the first time since independence ... MDC have alleged that at least 20 people have been killed in post-election violence, orchestrated by the police, soldiers and so-called war veterans, as part of Operation Mavhoterapapi. There have also been widespread reports of torture, the razing of houses and killing of livestock, perpetrated against people in rural areas suspected of voting for the opposition in the recent elections ... In July 2007, in an attempt to control rocketing food and other commodity prices as a result of Zimbabwe's hyperinflation - then running at about 4,000 percent annually - the government compelled businesses and manufacturers to slash the prices of their goods by 50 percent. Teams of inspectors were sent to retail shops and other businesses, and owners and employees who did not comply were either imprisoned or given hefty fines. The price controls saw the shop shelves empty ... Operation Chikorokoza Chapera/Isitsheketsha Sesiphelile (No Illegal Panning) More than 25,000 gold-panners were reportedly arrested in this operation in November 2006, in a bid to curtail artisanal mining ... Operation Murambatsvina (see below) deprived small traders of their stalls and goods, and Operation Sunrise (see below) destroyed savings, many people were left with little option but to pan for gold ... Five weeks after Operation Murambatsvina, the government launched Operation Garikai/Hlalani Kuhle, said to be a programme to build houses for the victims of their "slum clearance" operation ... The few houses that were built were reportedly given to civil servants, police and soldiers ... In an attempt to increase food production, the government deployed soldiers to farms in 2005 to oversee the production of maize, in an exercise called Operation Maguta ... The Third Chimurenga, otherwise known as the Fast Track Land Reform Programme, was launched in 2000 and resulted in most of Zimbabwe's 4,500 white-owned commercial farms being redistributed to landless blacks ...Zimbabwe's armed forces chief, General Constantine Chiwenga, is alleged to have received 17 farms since 2000. Chimurenga, the Shona word for "struggle", was the name given to the indigenous resistance mounted against British settlers between 1896-1897 after their land was seized by colonists ... Operation Gukurahundi (The rain that washes away the chaff before the spring rain) In 1983, the North Korean-trained 5th Brigade, under the command of Lt Col Perence Shire, once known as the "Black Jesus", but currently the commander of Zimbabwe's air force, was the vanguard unit in a campaign against alleged dissidents that has also become known as the Matabeleland Massacres. At least 20,000 people were killed in the operation. The target of Gukurahundi was members of the rival liberation movement, ZAPU, led by Joshua Nkomo and drawn mainly from Zimbabwe's Ndebele people ... Mugabe reportedly said in April 1983: "We eradicate them. We don't differentiate when we fight because we can't tell who is a dissident and who is not." ... A human rights pressure group based in The Hague, Crimes Against Humanity Zimbabwe, is campaigning for Gukurahundi to be recognised as genocide.

Terror in Zimbabwe: shocking pictures

Thu, 08 May 2008 10:33:47 -0400

OPERATION MAVHOTERAPAPI (who did you vote for)
Kubatana.net
March 29, 2008 Post Election Violence & Retribution Perpetrated by Zanu PF Militia on MDC District/Provincial Office Bearers, Activists & Members ... THE FOLLOWING SLIDES CONTAIN SOME GRAPHIC IMAGES OF TORTURE AND MURDER VICTIMS. SENSITIVE VIEWERS BE WARNED ... HURUNGWE EAST MDC ORGANISING SECRETARY TAPIWA BWANDA 58 YRS BEATEN, STONED AND STABBED TO DEATH AT HIS HOME MHEREYENYOKA VILLAGE, KAROI ... T.L. FROM MUTEKEDE VILLAGE,UMP, MASH. EAST BURNED WITH PLASTIC FOR “BEING MDC” ... F. M. 38, DZIVARASEKWA EXT. BEATEN BY 12 SOLDIERS WITH CHAINS AND FAN BELTS. ALSO BEAT HIS SON (17) AND GUARD (24) BECAUSE HE FERRIED MDC SUPPORTERS TO PRE ELECTION RALLIES ... D.D. 46 YRS, NYAMANDANDARA VILLAGE MUDZI NORTH. BEATEN WITH IRON RODS BY ZPF MP NEWTON KACHEPA & PHINEAS KAMAPA ZPF YOUTH CHAIRMAN. SUSTAINED 2 FRACTURED ARMS & LEFT LEG ... MOSES BASHITIAWO FROM UMP CONSTITUENCY KAVAMBA WARD, WAS BEATEN BY ZANU PF AND THEN MADE TO CLIMB A TREE WITH A ROPE ROUND HIS NECK AND JUMP. RELATIVES WERE MADE TO BURY HIM IMMEDIATELY. ISAAC CHIPUPURIRA ZANU PF HEADMAN INVOLVED IN THE MURDER. TATENDA CHABIKA SHOT IN THE STOMACH AT CHIDYE SCHOOL, MUTOKO NORTH 17/4/08 (DIED IMMEDIATELY, BODY NOT RECOVERED ... This is a State planned militarised operation of retribution and intimidation on the opposition MDC officials, activists, members and supporters ...

Zimbabwe election crackdown continues

Thu, 08 May 2008 06:04:19 -0400

Zimbabwe: Lawyer's Arrest Raises Fear of Broader Crackdown
Reuters AlertNet 7/5/2008
(Johannesburg, May 7, 2008) � The Zimbabwe government's politically motivated arrest of prominent human rights lawyer Harrison Nkomo raises fears of a broader crackdown on government critics, Human Rights Watch said today. "The arrest of a leading human rights lawyer may signal the government's escalation of its crackdown on perceived opponents," said Georgette Gagnon, Africa director at Human Rights Watch ... Nkomo was arrested near his office in central Harare at 2:30 p.m. on May 7, 2008, and is being held at the Law and Order Section of Harare Central Police station. He faces the criminal charges of "insulting or undermining the authority of the head of state" under the Public Order and Security Act of 2002. Nkomo recently defended Barry Bearak, a New York Times correspondent arrested for working without accreditation on April 3 ... Since the elections, the authorities have arrested more than 100 presiding electoral officers. On April 25, 2008, they arrested more than 200 people who had sought shelter from the government's terror campaign at the headquarters of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in Harare ... Since the March 29 elections, Human Rights Watch has documented a pattern of increasing violence by the ruling ZANU-PF militia and the military ... "The ruling party's continuing brutality against the opposition makes a mockery of the runoff vote," said Gagnon ...

No peace in eastern DRC

Thu, 08 May 2008 03:12:40 -0400

Congo factions still recruiting child fighters - UN
Reuters Africa 8/5/2008

KINSHASA (Reuters) - Armed groups in Congo's violence-torn east have ignored pledges made this year to stop recruiting children to fight and to free minors already in their ranks, the United Nations said on Wednesday. Dozens of rebel movements and local militias signed up to a January 23 peace accord with Congo's government meant to end a lingering decade-old conflict in North and South Kivu provinces. However, daily ceasefire violations have rocked the plan and U.N. officials say armed groups have flouted their obligations to respect human rights and stop using child soldiers. "This solemn engagement, which demanded nothing more than good will on the part of the leaders of these armed groups, is still far from being a reality," Kemal Saiki, spokesman for Congo's U.N. peacekeeping mission, MONUC, told journalists. UNICEF, the U.N. children's agency, said it had reports of continuing recruitment by local Mai Mai militia, Tutsi insurgents, and Rwandan Hutu rebels in North Kivu. "We believe recruiting is still taking place, without question," Jaya Murthy, UNICEF's spokesman for the eastern part of Democratic Republic of Congo, told Reuters ... the International Criminal Court (ICC) announced it was seeking the arrest of Congolese warlord Bosco Ntaganda for conscripting children during a bloody ethnic conflict in the district of Ituri to the north of the Kivus. Ntaganda is now the military chief of renegade General Laurent Nkunda's North Kivu-based Tutsi rebellion ... At least 43 people were killed in fighting between Nkunda loyalists and the PARECO Mai Mai faction between April 20 and 28 in three villages around 100 km (64 miles) northwest of North Kivu's provincial capital Goma, MONUC said on Wednesday. At least 16,000 villagers fled those and other clashes in the province over the same period. North and South Kivu are still charged with racial tensions rooted in Rwanda's 1994 genocide ... the U.N. estimates around 75,000 refugees have fled violence since the deal was signed ...

Zimbabwe election stalemate deepens

Wed, 07 May 2008 05:31:54 -0400

Zimbabwe parties challenge parliamentary results
Reuters Africa

HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe's ruling ZANU-PF party and the opposition MDC have contested half the results of the March 29 parliamentary election, state media said on Wednesday, extending a stalemate that has triggered widespread violence. Official results showed ZANU-PF lost its parliamentary majority for the first time since independence in 1980, while the Movement for Democratic Change and a breakaway faction together secured enough seats to control the assembly ... The challenge will have no effect on the result of a parallel presidential ballot, however, which showed MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai won 47.9 percent against President Robert Mugabe's 43.2 percent, triggering a run-off since neither candidate won an absolute majority. The MDC has not said whether it will participate in the run-off. It believes Tsvangirai won the election outright ... The state-run Herald newspaper said ZANU-PF and the MDC had lodged 53 and 52 petitions respectively with the electoral court, citing irregularities they believed had affected the results. The challenges come after a recount of original results in 23 constituencies confirmed ZANU-PF's defeat ... independent Zimbabwean election monitoring group ZESN expressed doubt about the credibility of the results of the presidential election and accused ZANU-PF of attacking observers ... U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Monday he was talking to African states about how the world body could help make a run-off credible and expressed concern about the violence ...

Mugabe rounds up opposition, observers

Fri, 25 Apr 2008 10:01:14 -0400

Zimbabwe police in election raids
BBC news 25/4/2008
Riot police in Zimbabwe have carried out raids on headquarters of independent poll monitors and the opposition MDC ... vote-counting material was taken from the MDC office and activists hiding there were arrested. It was not clear whether anything was taken from the office of the monitors, the Zimbabwe Election Support Network. But the group said it feared the authorities wanted to hide evidence of an MDC win in last month's poll ... Witnesses at the MDC raid said at least 100 opposition supporters who had been taking refuge from the authorities in its Harvest House headquarters had been arrested ... activists had been fleeing political violence. "They took everyone in the building, including those who had come just to seek medical care. They are trying to destroy evidence of their brutality," Mr Chamisa said ... An anonymous source at the Zimbabwe Election Support Network said police had arrived at the group's headquarters shortly after the MDC raid and were searching through files and documents. The network is considered the only reliable source of information about the 29 March elections ... The electoral commission says it cannot release the presidential results until it completes a recount in 23 of the 210 constituencies. Three recounts of the parliamentary results have been completed - all confirmed the original results. President Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF party lost control of parliament for the first time since independence in 1980 ... Meanwhile, the Herald newspaper has condemned Zimbabwe's neighbours as "myopic stooges" for refusing to let a cargo of Chinese weapons cross their territory to landlocked Zimbabwe. "Zimbabwe is... under attack from the former coloniser and its allies. As such, Zimbabwe probably needs to arm itself more than any other country in Africa ...

Renewed fighting in eastern DRC

Fri, 25 Apr 2008 10:00:45 -0400

New fighting stops DR Congo aid
Virtue Online - West Chester,PA,USA

Renewed fighting in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo has forced the United Nations refugee agency to suspend aid to displaced people. The UNHCR said hundreds more people have fled their homes because of the latest clashes in North Kivu province. A week of clashes between the army and fighters from the FDLR of Rwandan Hutu rebels has killed 20 people after three months of relative calm, the UN says. The army says it is planning a major offensive against the FDLR ... The BBC's Arnaud Zajtman in Kinshasa says FDLR fighters attacked a camp where 1,500 people were sheltering on Thursday, forcing them to scatter ... UNHCR officials said most of the displaced people are women and children who are sheltering in public buildings. Some said their homes had been destroyed and their possessions looted, while some parents said they had lost touch with their children. The FDLR includes some of those Hutus involved in the 1994 genocide, who fled to DR Congo after Tutsis took power in Rwanda ... The displacement in the Rutshuru area, some 70km north of the provincial capital, Goma, comes three months after the signing of an accord in Goma between the government and a different armed group, led by renegade Tutsi General Laurent Nkunda. Gen Nkunda had also demanded that the FDLR be disarmed - he took up arms, saying he was protecting Congolese Tutsis from Hutu attacks ...

Communiqué of the African Emergency Summit on Zimbabwe (Dar es Salaam)

Fri, 25 Apr 2008 07:48:13 -0400

COMMUNIQUÉ OF THE AFRICAN EMERGENCY SUMMIT ON ZIMBABWE

DAR ES SALAAM, 21 APRIL 2008

We, the undersigned representatives of civil society from 21 countries in Africa, after meeting in Dar es Salaam on the 21 April 2008, and

after debating, interrogating and considering the events subsequent to the 29 March 2008 elections held in Zimbabwe,

and after noting the following:

the groundbreaking convening of such a diverse range of civil society organisations from all regions of the African continent, all mobilising for a solution to the Zimbabwean crisis;

Zimbabwe weapons ship doubles back

Wed, 23 Apr 2008 13:06:28 -0400

Zimbabwe weapons ship doubles back
IOL 23/4/2008
The United States has asked China to order the ship carrying weapons for Zimbabwe to return home. On Tuesday as the ship, identified as the An Yue Jiang, was spotted off Cape Town, US State Department spokesperson Tom Casey said Beijing had been told "to refrain from making additional shipments and, if possible, to bring this one back". ... "We don't think that under the present circumstances, given the current

Foreign tanks in transit in South Africa

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 10:20:14 -0400

Tanks spark Zim arms fears
News24.co. 22/4/2008

Johannesburg - A truckload of "Chinese-looking" tanks spotted by a military buff outside Pietermaritzburg early on Tuesday caused a brief stir over whether the controversial arms consignment bound for Zimbabwe had slipped through the net. "Tanks? Did you say tanks?" said Defence Secretary January Masilela. "I know nothing about that." ... ship's clearing agent Anton van Rensburg said: "They are going to the military in the Northern Cape for joint military exercises between Singapore and South Africa. "They have been temporarily imported for the exercises which will take place next week and finish in May. They are Singaporean tanks and they arrived yesterday (Monday). "I can assure you, and Zimbabweans, that they are definitely not going to Zimbabwe ... Van Rensburg said members of the Singaporean armed forces also arrived in South Africa, as they are the only people permitted to drive the tanks. The An Yue Jiang lifted its anchor off Durban on Friday night moments after the Durban High Court ordered it to dock in Durban and offload its controversial cargo into the custody of the sheriff of Durban. Meanwhile, Nicole Fritz, director of the Southern African Litigation Centre, which secured the court order, said they were monitoring two other ships, the Feng Shun Shan and the Le Shan, which arrived in Durban and Richards Bay on April 20 and 21 respectively ...