By Earnest Adonai Mthimkhulu| The Matabeleland Collective has demanded the army to withdraw its unconstitutional arrests of civilians and crackdown on civilians in areas such as Mabutweni, Iminyela and Pumala townships respectively.

Addressing a press conference on the social unrests occurring around the country, more particularly on Matabeleland which is the designated area of focus for the collective of more than 40 Community-Based Organizations (CBO) and Non-governmental Organisation (NGO), Jenniffer Williams said that there is a need to adhere to constitutional mandate and
soldiers must return to barracks so as to allow the police to do proper investigations without interference.

When citizens marched under the pretext of a peaceful protest against the government, there are hooligan who ended up breaking into shops, murdering a police officer, allegedly raping a number of women leading to the police focusing mainly on crushing protests and failing to fully protect civilians’ lives, houses and business leaving them vulnerable to the
above cases.

This however saw the army crackdown and beating civilians in areas of Mabutweni, Iminyela, Pumula just to mention a few and it seems the crackdown and the unlawfully unconstitutional investigations being carried out by the army; instead of the police, has re-traumatised civilians of Matabeleland with the Gukurahundi memories.

Dumisani Nkomo the CEO of Habbakkuk Trust stated that from the investigations they conducted prior to the social unrests, there is definately a third force which was not only organised and strategic but also coherent and in some places would just open using iron cutters in a systematic way.

Speaking as part of the Matabeleland collective, Mr Nkomo appealed to the government, local authority, the law enforcement officers and the president to allow the police to do thorough
investigations without army interference so that even the citizens may feel free to come up with more cases and allegation666