Am I Not Human? - To Be An Activist in Zimbabwe

"Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law."

And no, Mr. Mugabe, "the law" is whatever you say it is.

For my first entry to the "Am I Not Human?" blogging campaign run by Roots of Humanity, which seeks to draw attention to human rights violations, it seems only fitting to focus on the case of Jestina Mukoko, director of the Zimbabwe Peace Project, who has become yet another victim of one of the most brutally repressive dictatorships on the planet.

Three weeks after being abducted from her home in Harare, Mukoko briefly resurfaced earlier this week, along with eight other abducted activists, only to disappear again.

After being brought to court on Wednesday on trumped up charges of planning to topple the government of President Robert Mugabe, a judge ruled that the activist were being illegally detained and ordered their release so that they could receive medical care.

The Zimbabwean police being how they are, they refused to comply:

Attorney Beatrice Mtetwa said while a High Court judge ruled that activist Jestina Mukoko and her eight co-defendants should be released, police have allegedly moved the prisoners to an undisclosed location, The Times of London said Friday.

"I have just received information that they were taken by a red vehicle under armed police escort," Mtetwa alleged. "The police haven't complied with the order… I doubt if they will comply."

Mtetwa, who has not been allowed to see her client, believes that Mukoko is being held at the Chikurubi maximum security prison--described lovingly by a former inmate as "perhaps the most squalid jail that humankind has ever invented." Another defense attorney said that the state has no intention of releasing Mukoko or the other activists:

"Nothing has changed. The police have not moved an inch and our clients are still detained at Chikurubi Maximum Security Prison including the two-year-old child," Alec Muchadehama told AFP.

"The state is in contempt of court. The reason they brought some of them to court is for public relations purposes to save their image but the truth is that they have no intention of releasing them," he said.

(Somehow I doubt that the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC)  party's calls for the resignation of the police commissioner over the incident will be heeded, either.)

The violations of Mukoko and her co-defendant's rights are numerous and rampant: The right to life, liberty and security of person; likely the right to be free from torture and cruel treatment; the right to equal protection before the law; the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals; the right to be free from arbitrary arrest and detention; the right to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal....really, pretty much every single one of the rights articulated and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights has been violated in this case. (If you're gonna go for one, why not go for them all?)

Please visit Roots of Humanity to for a collection of ways that you can take action to promote the UDHR around the world. Visit the Louder than Swahili blog for a list of actions you can take to Free Jestina--written shortly after she disappeared the first time, but definitely still valid now.

[Photo: Jestina Mukoko arrives at court on Wednesday.]