Lifting the lid on Zimbabwe's brutality
Updated on 18 April 2007
A former henchman of Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe has told Channel 4 News of the brutality meted out under the repressive regime.
Not much to celebrate after 27 years, but Robert Mugabe's dwindling faithful gathered to cheer him today in the very stadium the Union Jack was lowered in after what the president today described as a century of oppression.
His detractors, of whom there are many, say he's the oppressor now; in his speech though he blamed everyone but himself for the suffering of his people.
He said: "I wish to applaud the resilience of our people, who have rejected the brazen attempts of our detractors, openly working in cahoots with our shameless local puppets to reverse the gains of our independence through regime change agenda."
The president went on to warn he'd never hesitate to deal firmly with what he called "those elements bent on fomenting anarchy and criminal activity."
'I wish to applaud the resilience of our people, who have rejected the brazen attempts of our detractors'Robert Mugabe
Green bombers
Twenty-seven years ago the celebration had been genuine. There was hope and there was freedom after decades of defiant white minority rule, which had ended in a 13-year bush war in which 30,000 died.
Robert Mugabe, triumphant guerrilla leader took the salute of empire from a youthful Prince Charles and made a promise to his people.
He had said: "I promise to be faithful and bear true allegience to Zimbabwe and observe the laws of Zimbabwe, so help me God."
But Comrade Robert Gabriel Mugabe broke his promise to his people; today they run the streets in terror, their leader had come to regard himself as above the very law he'd once swore he'd observe.
State law enforcers have become his party's private militia, used to ruthlessly repress all opposition to his ruinous social and economic policies.
There are the Green Bombers, graduates of Zimbabwe's national youth militia training scheme.
The government says these young men are simply taught discipline and emersed in patriotic values. But the Green Bombers are widely accused of spearheading Robert Mugabe's campaign of poltical violence.
Washington Mabada was a Green Bomber. Even at the training school, he claims, he was forced to commit acts of brutality.
He says he escaped to Nambia and claims he's being hunted by Zimbabwean intelligence. We are unable to independently veryify his story but in common with a human rights group and a prominent international organisation, we believe it to be true.
Judged among the cream of the bunch, he was hand-picked for "special duties" -- duties so gruesome that few if any have ever admitted the true nature of their tasks.
