(MISA/IFEX) – Police investigations into the abduction and torture of two journalists of the weekly “The Standard”, Mark Chavunduka and Ray Choto, have run into a brick wall of political and bureaucratic obstacles, one year after the retired chief justice, Anthony Gubbay, ordered an inquiry, the “Zimbabwe Independent” reported on 20 April 2001. In a […]
(MISA/IFEX) – Police investigations into the abduction and torture of two journalists of the weekly “The Standard”, Mark Chavunduka and Ray Choto, have run into a brick wall of political and bureaucratic obstacles, one year after the retired chief justice, Anthony Gubbay, ordered an
inquiry, the “Zimbabwe Independent” reported on 20 April 2001.
In a ruling handed down on 20 March 2000, Gubbay ordered Police Commissioner Augustine Chihuri to investigate reports that the two journalists were tortured while army custody. The journalists had petitioned the Supreme Court to order Chihuri to investigate the matter. Gubbay said Chavunduka and Choto were denied the right to protection by law when the police failed to investigate the torture allegations.
Acting Police Spokesperson Bothwell Mugariri told the “Zimbabwe Independent” that the case was still open. “I am not aware if there are any political obstacles. I am not in a position to say that, but as far as I am concerned the case is still open pending investigations,” said Mugariri.
On why an identification parade had not been conducted two years after the journalists were tortured, Mugariri said that he did not have any details about that.
Chavunduka told the “Zimbabwe Independent” that he supplied the police with information about his torturers when he met investigators at the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) offices in 1999, nine months after the event. “They recorded statements from me, but nothing has come out of that investigation since then, that is if there are any investigations going on,” said Chavunduka. “I told them that I could identify the torturers at an identification parade without doubt. I have absolutely no problem with that, but that identification parade never materialised,” said Chavunduka. “They never even took statements from Choto, so we wonder what it is they are investigating on Choto if they never recorded anything. It simply shows that they are not serious,” said Chavunduka.
Two police detectives, Inspector Mukungunungwa and Detective Inspector Chipfunde, were tasked with investigating the matter. It is understood that one of them was refused cooperation by the army when he went to the King George 5th (KGVI) army barracks.
Background Information
Chavunduka was invited by the army to KGVI headquarters and interrogated in January 1999, following the publication of a story alleging that some army officers had been arrested in an attempted coup. Choto, who initially refused orders by the army to report for questioning, was subsequently picked by the CID’s head of law and order, Inspector Boysen Mathema, and handed over to the military for torture sessions. The two journalists later received treatment for the injuries they sustained. Chihuri admitted in his affidavits filed in the Supreme Court in 1999 that the police handed over the two journalists to the army because the inquiry involved “highly sensitive matters of national security which could not be dealt with by the police.”
