“…the police at once jumped on her, beat her until she screamed”

Yesterday I blogged about the WOZA women, and quoted from their press release. Their measured reporting of what happened was horrible enough. Now read this, first had testimony from a witness to the violence. The reporter who was there to cover the event was clearly profoundly shocked by what he saw:

Women demonstrating peacefully on the streets of Bulawayo on Saturday were brutally beaten up by police. I saw several women knocked to the ground by police batons, then dragged screaming to police vehicles. More than 50 women later needed medical attention for their injuries.

[...]

There was some confusion, and then abruptly the police drew batons and began attacking women. Two young women holding a banner at the back of the procession were beaten up, and the crowd panicked and ran,

In the rush an elderly lady fell to the ground and was trampled. The police at once jumped on her, beat her until she screamed, then dragged her away, still screaming, to a police vehicle.

A member from Pumula, Eva Tanyanyiwa, was knocked unconscious by a police baton, then pulled away and arrested. Jenni Williams went to protest, and was herself arrested, as was her co-leader of WOZA, Magodonga Mahlangu.

I then approached a senior police officer, and asked why the police were attacking the march. He said that the protest was illegal and had to be stopped.

I saw no more of the march because, as I was reading the leaflet distributed by WOZA, I was myself knocked to the ground from a blow to the head by a baton-wielding policeman, and beaten again around the back and ribs as I ran to escape.

The senseless stupidity and desperation of a country at war with its own people. How brave does a policeman have to be to whack an elderly woman? Disgusting!

This entry was posted by Hope on Tuesday, March 11th, 2008 at 5:51 pm. You can follow any comments on this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.