Research Unit
Zimbabwe
Annual Report
for 2006
20 August 2007
Table of Contents
Table of Contents...................................................................................................... 1
Background................................................................................................................ 2
Introduction................................................................................................................. 2
Data Bases and data collection............................................................................... 3
Reports....................................................................................................................... 5
Monthly Political Violence Report (MPVR)............................................................. 5
Special Reports......................................................................................................... 6
Human Rights Bulletin............................................................................................... 8
Press statements..................................................................................................... 10
Recommendations.................................................................................................. 12
Conclusion................................................................................................................ 12
Background
The Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum (also known as the
"Human Rights Forum") has been in existence since January 1998 when 9
Non-Governmental Organizations (NGO’s) working in the field of human rights
joined together to provide legal and psychosocial assistance to the victims of
the Food Riots of January 1998. The coalition’s membership has since increased
to 17. The Human Rights Forum expanded its objectives to assist victims of
organized violence, using the following definition:
"Organized
violence,” means the inter-human infliction of significant avoidable pain and
suffering by an organized group according to a declared or implied strategy
and/or system of ideas and attitudes. It comprises any violent action, which is
unacceptable by general human standards, and relates to the victims’ mental and
physical well-being."
The Human Rights Forum operates a Research and Documentation
Unit and offers legal services through the Public Interest Unit of the
(formerly the Legal Unit of the ZHRF.)
Introduction
The Specific objective of the
Research unit is “to document, research on, verify and publish incidents of
gross violations of human rights in
1
Severe pain and suffering, whether physical or mental
2
Intentionally inflicted
3
With a purpose
4
By a state official or another
individual acting with the acquiescence
of the State.
The
Research Unit has fared well in the delivery of its objective albeit with some
unforeseen temporary setbacks such as insufficient human and financial
resources as shall be seen in this report. The Unit has throughout the year
produced press statements on important occasions as well as on issues of
concern in the respect of human rights in
Data Bases and
data collection
Throughout
the year the Unit collected information from member organizations, partner
organizations as well as from the Public Interest Unit of the Forum itself.
This information was then fed into the databases, which are in keep of the
Forum. The Unit operates four databases, which are interlinked. These data
bases include the
1.
Press politically motivated
violations of human rights. This database contains information from the public
domain on politically motivated violations of human rights. The main source has
been newspapers but with time there is now also use of electronic Internet media.
The newspapers that the unit used were local newspapers for ease of reference
and verification of the information through the newspapers’ libraries. These
newspapers have included The Herald, The Sunday Mail, The Chronicle, The Manica
Post, The Financial Gazette, The Standard and The Independent. Of the above
only 3 are independent newspapers, with one of them, The Financial Gazette
having its independence questioned by others. The other 2, The Independent and
The Standard are from the same media house. The independent newspapers operate
only on a weekly basis.
2.
Press general human rights
violations. This database contains general human rights violations from the
press as mentioned above.
3.
Unreported politically motivated
violations of human rights. This database contains information that has not
been reported in the public domain or information that has been reported in the
public domain but is also gathered from primary sources of information. This
involves victims coming to report to the forum in order to get free legal
assistance and also victims reporting to partner and member organizations in
order to get some free assistance including counselling, medical assistance etc
4.
The last database is one for
unreported general human rights violations. This database contains all the
other human rights violations as mentioned in 3 above but violations that are
not politically motivated.
The
information in the databases is used for compiling the Monthly Political
Violence Report (MPVR), which will be discussed below. The information is also
used to furnish international lawyers with information on asylum cases as well
as for donors, diplomats, partner and member organizations as well as
interested individuals as and when sought. It is also hoped that the same databases
would be used in the event of a transition for transitional justice purposes in
terms of truth seeking, Truth Commission and possible prosecutions. The
information has also been used for other special and ad hoc reports as well as
for litigation purposes.
Even
though this system should be both an effective and efficient way of gathering
data and utilizing the data, there have been problems on the implementation of
the system. There have been problems in 2006, in data collection due to
misunderstandings and outright territoriality on the parts of some partner and
member organizations. The problems have led to the information being collected
not being as far reaching as was hoped and also in the delay in publishing the
MPVRs. The Research Unit, with the help of the Executive Director has on
countless occasions in the year tried to resolve these problems. It is hoped
that the Unit will hold a research and documentation workshop in which these
misunderstandings can be ironed out and also relations will be mended between
partners and members of the Forum.
Due to
the problems above and also the fact that not all information will come to our
attention for one reason or other, even though our reports and databases are a
reliable source of information, they cannot be considered as the exhaustive
record of all incidents of politically motivated violations of human rights
occurring in the country at any given period. Nevertheless, of the 5 792
incidents reported in 2006, a huge total of 368 torture cases were recorded.
Moreover, 1 566 violations against freedom of expression and association were
recorded, 1 460 and 1 457 violations of unlawful arrests and unlawful
detentions respectively, 55 displacements as well as 296 on political
discrimination, victimization and intimidation.
Reports
There are 3 types of reports that are
compiled by the unit. These include Special/ad hoc reports, the human rights
bulletin and the MPVR.
Monthly Political Violence Report (MPVR)
The objective of this report is to
analyze every month, the trend of political violence and violations of rights
that are politically motivated. The statistical analysis of the violations are
done and events during a month are also analyzed in order to see whether or not
events correspond to violations and what events would lead to greater
violations of humans rights. In 2006, a total of 11 reports were done for each
month up to November and the report for December was done at the beginning of
2007. The December MPVR was an analysis of the years 2005 and 2006 as well as
presenting the statistics for December 2006. Conclusions drawn from this report
indicate an increase in violations from 2005 even though 2005 was an election
year and 2006 was not. This also showed a steady increase in human rights violations
in each year from the time that the Forum started issuing these reports. The
only exception being 2004, where there was a decrease in human rights
violations. All these reports can be accessed through our website.
Special Reports
The Forum issued ad hoc and special
reports that dealt with pertinent issues during the year. To access the report
itself please click on the link if you are online.
Exploring
transitional justice options in contemporary Zimbabwe
(January 2006). This report dealt with
issues of transitional justice in
An
analysis of Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum legal cases 1998 - 2006 (June
2006) The legal cases report was an analysis of the Forum’s Public Interest
Unit legal cases in order to ascertain the level of success in the cases that
the organization brought to Zimbabwean Courts as well as to rebut the assertion
by Government that there were no human rights violations in Zimbabwe. The cases
brought to court and won by the Forum were living proof that there were not
only human rights violations in
Political
repression disguised as Civic Mindedness: Operation Murambatsvina one year
later (November
2006) This report was an analysis of the disastrous venture and madness that
the Government of Zimbabwe visited on the people of
"Who
guards the guards?" Violations by Law Enforcement Agencies in Zimbabwe,
2000-2006 (December
2006) The report targeted law enforcement agencies to see if they had
mechanisms for checks and balances in the event that there were excesses in the
police force. This report came about as a result of the insurmountable number
of violations perpetrated by the law enforcement agencies against unarmed
civilians who wanted to exercise their rights and freedoms in the country.
Zimbabwe's
Failure To Meet The Benchmarks In The Cotonou Agreement
(December 2006) This report targeted the
African Caribbean Pacific-European Union (ACP-EU) Joint Parliamentary Assembly
(JPA) in order to show them that Zimbabwe had not complied with the Cotonou
agreement regarding good governance, democracy and the respect and protection
of human rights.
"A
Woman's Place is in the Home?" Gender Based Violence and Opposition
Politics in Zimbabwe (December 2006) The report on the role of women in politics
was occasioned by the fact that women in opposition had been labeled
“Tsvangirai’s whores”. This report is an analysis of women’s participation in
opposition politics and the violations of their rights due to this
participation.
Human Rights Bulletin
These
were formerly known as Human Rights Monthlies but were changed to Human Rights
Bulletins due to the fact that it became financially unsustainable to publish
them monthly hence the change. Human Rights Bulletins discuss issues of
importance in human rights. They are mainly done to raise awareness on the
rights that groups possess. The choice of subject and topic is instructed by
prevailing circumstances and priority areas as decided by events taking place
at any given time. In 2006, 3 bulletins were published. Of the 3, only 2 were
published as hard copies and the bulletin on the right to education was
produced only as a soft copy and also posted on the Internet. This was due to
the unavailability of funds as well as the incredibly high costs of printing in
The African Commission and Zimbabwe
No. 38
(January)
This bulletin was written to inform the Zimbabwean people
about the role of the African Commission on
Spousal Notification and HIV/AIDS
No. 39
(March)
The
bulletin on spousal notification discussed the rights of spouses regarding
notification of HIV status.
The Right to Education
No. 40
(July)