Pro-democracy activists Robson Chere, Namatai Kwekweza, and Samuel Gwenzi were denied bail on Friday, 16 August, by Harare Magistrate Ruth Moyo.
The three were arrested on July 31 and charged with disorderly conduct for allegedly staging a protest at the Harare Magistrates Court demanding the release of jailed Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) interim leader Jameson Timba and other opposition activists.
Magistrate Moyo cited several reasons for denying bail, including the activists’ potential to commit further offences, the likelihood of causing public unrest if released, and the risk of interfering with state witnesses.
Kwekweza, Chere, Gwenzi, and another individual, Vusa Moyo, were forcibly removed from a plane at Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport by unidentified state agents. They were held incommunicado for several hours before being handed over to the police.
Separately, activist Briggs Bomba, who serves as the Programs Director for TrustAfrica—a pan-African foundation promoting democratic governance—recently escaped a possible abduction.
Reports indicate that heavily armed individuals believed to be state security agents raided a leisure facility operated by Bomba while searching for him; however, he was not there at the time.
In a statement released on 14 August, Bomba claimed that “paranoid” government officials act on “flawed intelligence” to unjustly imprison innocent people Said Bomba:
This attempt on my life echoes the broader crackdown on civil society ahead of the SADC Heads of State summit on August 17, 2024, in Harare.
The government has detained dozens of activists as part of this crackdown. It appears that the government misguidedly connected the 5th African Philanthropy Conference, co-hosted by TrustAfrica from July 29 to August 2, 2024, in Victoria Falls, with planned protests during the SADC summit in Harare.
Four individuals travelling to the conference, Namatai Kwekweza, Robson Chere, Samuel Gwenzi, and Vusa Moyo, were detained at the Harare airport and are still in custody two weeks later.
The four were interrogated about the conference, and in the process of these interrogations, it became evident that state agents were circling around my name.
It’s surprising that the state would perceive an event like the African Philanthropy Conference as a threat…
It is alarming to witness the unjust treatment of innocent citizens due to the state’s paranoia and ill-informed intelligence.
For instance, Vusa Moyo, a well-known sound engineer, was detained on his way to Victoria Falls to manage the sound for a musical performance during an official dinner. Despite being innocent, he has been held in prison without bail for two weeks.
Equally, Namatai Kwekweza, Robson Chere, and Samuel Gwenzi are all innocent civil society leaders who were part of the local participants, yet they continue to be detained without bail.
This situation serves as an indefensible indictment of state leadership today – exposing the grave dangers posed by a paranoid leadership operating with flawed intelligence.
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