FARAI MUTSAKA
Barely a week after being elected as a local councilor for Zimbabwe’s main opposition party, Womberaiishe Nhende and a relative were pulled out of their car by unidentified men, shot with a stun gun and handcuffed.
They were then bundled into a pickup truck and driven about 70 kilometers (more than 40 miles) outside of Harare, the capital, where they were whipped, beaten with truncheons and interrogated, and injected with an unknown substance, their lawyers say.
Having been questioned over what their Citizens Coalition for Change party is planning after August’s disputed and troubled national election, the ordeal ended when the two men were dumped naked near a river, the lawyers allege.
Their story isn’t new in the southern African nation, which has a long history of violence and intimidation against opposition to the ZANU-PF party during its 43-year rule.
There are signs that the country has now
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