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Human Rights Violations Continue Upsurge: ZPP

by BustopTV

By Lerato Ndlovu

Over four thousand citizens suffered human rights violations in June, the Zimbabwe Peace Project (ZPP) monthly monitoring report has revealed.

According to ZPP this winter turned out to be harsh for most of the Zimbabwean citizens who are facing an uneven economic meltdown and a period that has left many jobless, hungry and fearing for their lives as the uniformed forces are causing civil unrest read the June report.

“In Zimbabwe, the winter season peaks in the month of June, but far from the usual cold weather the month brings, Zimbabweans across the country experienced a worsening economic situation characterised by price increases and inflation.

“On the human rights front, the situation was no better, as the country continued to find itself sliding further into an undoubted military state as confirmed by the prevalence of human rights violations perpetrated by the police and the army with artless impunity”.

The Zimbabwe Peace Project (ZPP) human rights monitoring records of June 2020 indicated 4,211 cases of harassment and intimidation, attempted abduction, torture, rape and sexual assault, attempted murder, displacement, unlawful detention and malicious damage to property by institutions that are expected to protect the citizens.

“The police and the army contributed to a combined 58.2 percent of perpetrators of human rights violations as compared to last month were they held 63.46 percent, with Harare leading.

“Apart from the repression, the economic crisis has gone full circle, and in the month of June, exactly a year after the Finance ministry reintroduced the Zimbabwean dollar, the local currency virtually died after government announced they would be paying civil servants up to US$75 to cushion them from the ravaging inflation, which has left the local currency virtually useless.”

Both the formal and informal sector have continued to operate under strict restrictions that add regressing into repression as wars between the labour unions and the government rise in regards to salaries and welfare of the workers.

“The informal sector, and civil servants continue to earn money that cannot buy even a pair of shoes, with unpaid promised payouts which are not going to be given out as direct cash, resulting into war between government and its workers as labour unions demand full salaries in US$.

“Operations of the informal sector were put to hault by the introduction of the national lockdown meaning that, for a country that has over 94 percent of its citizens in the informal sector according to the Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency (ZimStat), there have been 91 complete days from April to the end of June with no income for citizens.

“Consequently, Zimbabwe has taken many steps into an acute economic recession that has impacted hugely on various socio-economic rights,” read part of the report.

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