We are appalled that ZCTU President Lovemore Matombo,1st Vice President Lucia Matibenga and Secretary General Wellington Chibebe were so were heavily assaulted at Matapi Police station in Mbare that Matombo and Chibebe could not manage to stand after the assaults and had to change the clothes they were wearing as they were soaked in blood, and that Matibenga had swollen feet and could not walk. It is further intolerable that they were denied access to either medical or, at first, legal assistance. COSATU sends its best wishes to them, and all the others who were assaulted for a full recovery.

Both Lucia Matibenga and Wellington Chibebhe were expected to attend COSATU’s 9th National Congress next week, but their injuries are so serious that this is now in doubt.

The assaults followed a systematic blitz by police in every town and city where the ZCTU was planning to hold marches to protest at the intolerable levels of unemployment and poverty in Zimbabwe. People arriving at the assembly points were being arrested indiscriminately and none of the marches could proceed.

The state’s ruthless response confirms conclusively that this regime holds human rights and democracy in contempt. The marchers were exercising a basic human and trade union right to peaceful protest but were totally thwarted by heavy-handed pre-emptive police action.

The COSATU Congress will undoubtedly wish to discuss this report and we hope that it will take the opportunity to condemn this latest attack on the trade union movement and urge trade unions throughout the world to register the strongest possible protests to the Zimbabwe government. We also urge the governments attending the upcoming Non-Aligned Movement Conference in Havana, including the South African government, to protest to the Zimbabwe government delegation.

COSATU will be continuing and intensifying its campaign of solidarity with its fellow workers in Zimbabwe. An injury to one is an injury to all!