<nettime> FWD: Support Zimbabwe writers & journalists

["Peter Horn" <hornpete@iafrica.com>]

>Dear fellow writers,
>
>You might have read/heard of the recent military detention of Zimbabwe
>Standard newspaper journalist, editor and managing editor Ray Choto,
>Mark Chavunduka and Clive Wilson, respectively and the torture that
>was visited upon them. They are now supposed to stand trial for daring
>to do what every journalist and writer does: write! In this particular
>instance, they'd apparently exposed one of Zimbabwe government's best
>kept secret: the fact that some 23 military officers rose against the
>government for involvement in the bloody war in the Democratic
>Republic of Congo (DRC). Now they are on bail pending a trial on
>charges of reporting this.
>
>I know Ray Choto personally: he's my colleague as well, as the current
>and founding Co-ordinating Secretary of the SADC-wide Southern African
>Writers' Council (SAWCO). He is also the Secretary General of  the
>Zimbabwe Writers' Council (ZWC). Besides these positions and being an
>excellent investigative journalist (he was the first to expose Robert
>Mugabe's planned secret marriage before Mugabe decided  to do it
>publicly! Ray was hounded for this, he had to be on the run!), Ray is
>also a poet and novelist - writing mostly in Shona. 
>
>This note serves to invite and urge South African and other 
>countries' writers to add their voice (individually and collectively) 
>in support of the rights of the above-mentioned journalists and 
>writers.
>
>The email address of the Zimbabwe Standard newspaper is:
>standard@samara.co.zw. We may later have to send our protest
>letters/pamphlets to the Zimbabwe High Commission and Consulate.
>
>I thank you
>
>Raks Morakabe Seakhoa
>Chairperson - Southern African Writers' Council (SAWCO)
>Convenor - South African Writers' Federation (SAWFED)
>______________________________________________________________________
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