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Amnesty International Report 2017/18

intending to assemble or convene a public 

meeting or demonstration was required to 

give the police seven days’ notice. However, 

the police interpreted the law as imposing a 

requirement to obtain prior authorization for 

any public assembly to proceed. On 24  

August, police dispersed a prayer meeting 

convened to welcome Hakainde Hichilema’s 

release from Mukobeko Maximum Security 

Prison in Kabwe city where he had been held 

for four months on charges of treason, which 

were dropped.

On 10 January, UK lawyer Oliver Holland 

was arrested and charged under the Public 

Order Act with unlawful assembly for meeting 

with a community in Chingola city who was 

challenging in court environmental pollution 

allegedly caused by a mining company. He 

was released the same day and charges 

against him were dropped; however, he was 

later charged with conduct likely to breach 

the peace and ordered to pay a USD5 fine.

Police frequently used unnecessary and 

excessive force to disperse protesters.

In April, police stopped a UPND rally in 

Kanyama Township in the capital, Lusaka, on 

“security” grounds. Although the UPND had 

notified the police in advance of the rally, 

they unlawfully dispersed the rally, shooting 

20-year-old Stephen Kalipa, one of the 

protesters. He died later from gunshot 

wounds at the hospital. An investigation was 

opened, but no one had been arrested in 

connection with the incident by the end of 

the year. The police claimed that he died of 

knife stab wounds at the hands of an 

unidentified assailant.

On 23 June, police arrested senior UPND 

officials on charges of unlawful assembly 

alleging that they held a press briefing at 

the UPND’s secretariat offices without 

obtaining prior authorization. On 29 

September, police arrested six human rights 

defenders who gathered outside Parliament 

and protested peacefully against the 

government’s purchase, at the inflated cost of 

USD42 million, of 42 fire engines; they were 

charged with refusing to obey police orders. 

The protesters were beaten during the protest 

by members of the ruling Patriotic Front.

EXCESSIVE USE OF FORCE

On 8 April, Hakainde Hichilema and other 

UPND members − Lastone Mulilandumba, 

Muleya Haachenda, Wallace Chakwa, 

Pretorius Haloba and Hamusonde Hamaleka 

− were arrested and charged with treason 

and disobeying a lawful order following an 

earlier incident in which Hakainde 

Hichilema’s motorcade refused to give way to 

President Lungu’s convoy. Police raided 

Hakainde Hichilema’s house without a 

warrant, using tear gas against him and his 

family. On 28 April, his wife, Mutinta, was 

threatened with arrest after she reported the 

police’s use of excessive force. No charges 

had been brought against the police in 

connection with the incident by the end of 

the year. On 15 August, the Director of Public 

Prosecutions withdrew all charges against 

Hakainde Hichilema and the other UPND 

members.

FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION

Security forces and political activists affiliated 

with the Patriotic Front subjected media 

workers, political activists and others who 

criticized the government to harassment and 

intimidation.

Staff of the Law Association of Zambia were 

harassed and intimidated because of their 

work in defence of human rights. On 3 

March, for example, Patriotic Front loyalists 

stormed the Association’s offices demanding 

the resignation of its president, Linda 

Kasonde.

Later the same month, the Association 

joined a High Court petition to prevent the 

liquidation of Post Newspapers – known to be 

highly critical of the government − in 

proceedings in which the Zambia Revenue 

Authority, among others, sought the 

company’s liquidation, alleging that it had 

failed to pay taxes.

On 3 August, police arrested Saviour 

Chishimba, president of the United 

Progressive People party on defamation 

charges after he criticized President Lungu 

for declaring a threatened state of 

emergency. Saviour Chishimba was detained 

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for seven days, without being brought before 

a judge; he was released without charge.

In October, the Independent Broadcasting 

Authority summoned Prime Television 

Zambia’s management to answer allegations 

that they had violated the provisions of their 

broadcasting licence when they covered a 

story about the UPND’s parliamentary 

candidate for Kalulushi town, Everisto 

Mwalilino, who had accused government 

officials of electoral corruption. The station 

had also highlighted corruption allegations 

against former Information Minister, 

Chishimba Kambwili.

JUSTICE SYSTEM

The government verbally attacked the 

judiciary, which undermined the 

independence of the institution. At the same 

time, there was a growing public perception 

of the judiciary as a polarized institution in 

which some judges were not politically 

independent. In September, while on a visit 

to South Africa, Hakainde Hichilema accused 

the judiciary of corruption and of being under 

the control of the President. On 2 November, 

President Lungu warned judges against 

blocking him from running for President in 

2021. In November, on a trip to Solwezi, he 

warned judges against following Kenyan 

judges who, in September, had ruled to annul 

the results of Kenya’s presidential elections.

RIGHT TO FOOD

The 2017 Global Hunger Index reported that 

food insecurity and undernourishment 

remained alarmingly high. Many subsistence 

farmers were affected because they were 

denied access to their land due to ongoing 

land disputes. In Mpande, Northern 

Province, over 300 people were locked into a 

legal dispute with the government after they 

were forcibly evicted from their land to an 

arid region where they could not produce 

food. In Kaindu, Mumbwa District, the 

owners and employees of a German-owned 

safari company shot at, and verbally abused, 

members of a 700-strong community, 

preventing them from fishing in the Kafue 

River and gathering food from the forest. The 

community was not fully consulted over the 

use of its land for safaris.

ZIMBABWE

Republic of Zimbabwe

Head of state and government: Emmerson Dambudzo 

Mnangagwa (replaced Robert Gabriel Mugabe in 

November)

Activists and human rights defenders 

continued to mobilize to hold the 

government to account through protests on 

the streets and via social media. The state 

continued to use the law to crack down on 

dissenting voices. The authorities continued 

with forced evictions despite constitutional 

provisions prohibiting the practice. 

Independence of the judiciary remained 

under threat following amendments to the 

Constitution.

BACKGROUND

The economic situation worsened with no 

solution to the liquidity crisis in sight.

In October, the Ministry of Cyber Security, 

Threat Detection and Mitigation was 

established in response to social media 

activism.

Factionalism and succession battles within 

the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union–

Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) party intensified; 

President Mugabe dismissed the then First 

Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa on 6 

 November, for allegedly plotting against the 

government and exhibiting “disloyalty, 

deceitfulness, disrespect and unreliability”. 

On 14 November, the military took power and 

after public support for the military action, 

and Parliament’s impeachment process, 

Robert Mugabe resigned on 21 November. 

Emmerson Mnangagwa was sworn in as 

President on 24 November.

FREEDOMS OF ASSOCIATION AND 

ASSEMBLY

The police dispersed meetings or peaceful 

protests using excessive force.

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