An attack on a political rally by uniformed soldiers is stoking fears of a reprise of state-sponsored violence against NGOs, human rights activists and parties opposed to President Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF in the lead-up to a referendum on a draft constitution and scheduled parliamentary and presidential elections in 2013. Welshman Ncube, the leader of the smaller Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), addressed a gathering of about 1,000 people at the 21 September rally in Mutoka, in Zimbabwe’s Mashonaland East Province, before the assault occurred.

Zimbabwe Environmental Law Association (ZELA) in partnership with the Zimbabwe Council of Churches (ZCC) and Chiadzwa Community Development Trust (CCDT) immaculately hosted a three day 'People's Indaba' at the Harare Crowne Plaza Hotel, from the 11th - 13th September this year. The event, known officially as the 'Zimbabwe Alternative Mining Indaba' (ZAMI), saw over 120 individuals including; Chiefs, Legislators, church leaders, mining communities, community based organizations, regional participants, youth and women activists and media taking part in the indaba.

Recently, Zimbabwe’s Supreme Court unanimously 'chastised' state security agents for torturing Jestina Mukoko, national director of the Zimbabwe Peace Project, four years ago, reports blog Africa is a Country. 'They came at dawn, December 3, 2008. Armed men broke into the house of Jestina Mukoko, the only surviving parent of a teenage child who watched, helplessly. They took her, in unmarked cars, and held her incommunicado for 21 days. During that time, they beat her feet with rubber truncheons. They dumped her into solitary confinement. They forced her to kneel on gravel, to endure searing pain.'