Mugabe’s official thugs claim the life of a true Zimbabwean heroine.

Yesterday - Sunday, November 11 - we buried Maria Moyo. A thousand people came to her graveside at Bulawayo’s Hyde Park Cemetery, to mourn the death of a gallant woman who stood up against the appalling injustice of our country’s government, and paid the ultimate price for her courage.

Mrs Moyo was one of the founders of Women Of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA), in 2003. Together with her fellow leaders Jenni Williams and Magodonga Mahlangu, she led peaceful marches and demonstrations against human rights abuses. She demanded respect for women. She asked for justice. In Zimbabwe she asked for too much.

In the short four years of WOZA, she was arrested ten times. Each time she was physically and mentally abused by the police. The last arrest came on August 24. It resulted in her death. No doubt the police consider this a positive outcome. This is what happened.

Six members of the police Law and Order section, the department usually responsible for the torture of opposition activists, burst into her home in Mabuthweni suburb in Bulawayo at mid-day. They found Mrs Moyo in bed, seriously ill with pneumonia, the result of her previous ill-treatment at the hands of the authorities.

Her family pleaded with the police not to take her away, saying she was too ill to be moved, but they refused to listen. She was arrested, dragged outside, and put in a police vehicle along with four other women, all members of WOZA.

They were taken to Khami dam on the outskirts of the city, where for five hours they were interrogated, abused and tortured. At one point they were tied up with ropes, and told they would be dumped in the sewage-polluted waters of the dam. Only a party of passers-by, including a photographer, prevented the threat from becoming a reality.

By this time Mrs Moyo’s condition was clearly deteriorating. It is thought that the police didn’t want her to die while in custody. They drove her back to her home, and left her there. Her family took her to hospital, where her condition slowly worsened. She died on November 6.

At the funeral, her co-leader Magodonga Mahlangu said this: “I would like it to be known that the police are responsible for her death… She will be remembered for her ready smile even in harsh jail conditions. She will be remembered for her courage and comitment. May her soul rest in peace in a better place than the living hell of Zimbabwe.”

Maria Moyo was 57. She leaves a husband, nine children, and 12 grandchildren. And she leaves us all, much the poorer for her loss.

(Source)