Itai Muzondo
GWERU: George Perry Floyd Jr. was an African American man killed during an arrest after a store clerk alleged, he had passed a counterfeit $20 bill in Minneapolis saw the world speaking one word against police brutality especially that was enforced on racial gorunds.
Back home, there is no racial card to talk about but pure police brutality that has gone unaccounted for especially when the poor are victim.
The late Tatenda Kasinyore ‘Nyale’ Kasinyore’s is such one case.
His death and funeral has been the talk of Mambo-Mtapa area, if not Gweru and Zimbabwe at large after his family and community are up for nothing but justice following the unclear circumstances leading to his death while in police custody last week.
The aggrieved residents and family, that Nyale died because of wounds sustained while under arrest to the hands of police officers opposed to police submission that he died to wounds sustained while trying to evade justice.
The officers responsible for the now late Nyale’s arrest have been identified as Constable Shoko, Constable Mufara, Constable Mahachi, Constable Mashingaidze and Constable Hove.
Nyale’s road to his final place of rest however resulted in business standstill after police fired teargas to protestants marching and singing on their way to pay their last respects.
Following events as they unfolded, an eye witness and community leader said family had decided to sing and march past through the police station as they protest peacefully against police brutality before events turned otherwise after one of the protestants only identified as Rasta got arrested.
“We had successfully passed through the police station amid heavy police presence but the worst happened after one of us got arrested. People then decided to seek answers to why they had arrested him while chanting slogans and protest songs to which police reacted to firing teargas.
“We had no intention to dump the coffin at the police station as perceived and if we wanted to, we could have done so while at their gate. This is why the body was at the Mtapa traffic lights junction to show that pandemonium had led to the body being dumped,” said the witness who denied identification for fear of victimisation.
Nyale’s body lied on the junction for close to an hour.
78 people were arrested during the fracas. More people were however later arrested soon after the burial as police went into an arresting blitz on those they identified as frontrunners in the protest.
National police spokesperson Assistant Commissioner Paul Nyathi told a local state newspaper that ‘…police had to disperse residents who had violated Covid-19 lockdown regulations to have a maximum of 30 people gathering at a funeral.’
Asst Comm Nyathi further told the paper that ‘…police had to maintain law and order after some unnamed civil society organisations and purported human rights activists hijacked the funeral resulting in the commotion.’
Contrary to the initial police report that states that Kasinyore was pronounced dead while in the police cells, Asst Comm Nyathi further told the paper that Kasinyore died at Gweru Provincial Hospital in the early hours of Wednesday.
He however said police were carrying out further investigations to establish what led to Kasinyore’s death.
CommuTalk is reliably informed that witnesses who saw the turn of events when Nyale got arrested have since been interviewed with the police including those whom he shared the cell with upon his arrest.
Post-mortem results given to this publication also show that Nyale suffered pulmonary laceration which is formation of an air or blood-filled cavity, occurs after blunt or penetrating trauma and hypovolemic shock which is caused by blood loss when a major blood vessel bursts or when one is seriously injured.
The Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights have engaged Gundu, Dube and Pamacheche Law Firm to help the family seek justice.
Police have often been caught on the wrong side of the law with no much detail given over their verdicts and in a similar case that happened in Woodlands, a Gweru police officer, Nyashadzaishe Paradza shot a young boy, Chrismore Masimba on the leg and to pay only USD250 as compensation to a family whose livelihood is sustained through vending.
