Weapons theft stokes fears of instability

(IRIN) – The recent “suicide” of a senior army officer in the wake of a break-in at a military armoury in Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare, is sowing fears that the missing guns may be used to fuel instability.

In late October, 20 Chinese manufactured AK-47s and a number of shotguns were stolen from the armoury at the Pomona army barracks in Harare. The deputy commander of Pomona barracks, Major Maxwell Samudzi, had “committed suicide” while being held in solitary confinement, according to a report in the government newspaper, The Herald.

Local media reports said as many as 120 serving soldiers were detained in connection with the theft and allegedly tortured. Since then, a member of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), Pascal Gwezere, has been arrested, allegedly tortured, and charged with the theft.

Morgan Komichi, deputy organising secretary of the MDC, told IRIN that Gwezere’s arrest was part of “short- to long-term strategy” by President Robert Mugabe to destabilise the MDC party, led by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, which joined Zimbabwe’s fragile unity government in February 2009.

The unity government – an uneasy partnership between Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party and the MDC – broke down in October after Tsvangirai “disengaged” from it, returning to the fold only after the Southern African Development Community (SADC) intervened.

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