There is evidence that the regime is making some effort to respond to persistent criticism of the security forces by bringing selected offenders to court. A series of cases alleging assault and murder of civilians by members of the security forces and regime officials has been reported in the Rhodesian press in recent months. These trials may serve a useful purpose, as far as the regime is concerned, by demonstrating that positive action is being taken to curb excesses by troops. On the other hand, they cast serious doubt on the regime's frequently repeated argument that the security forces, in which Africans, it is claimed, are now in the majority, have undergone a significant change in character and are now trusted and liked by the majority of the black population.
Four Guard Force members including a keep commander were charged with murder in the Salisbury High Court, in May—June 1979 following the death of a 40-year-old man, Vesi Chibaya, of Musarakufa Protected Village, Mtoko, on 19 April 1978. The four were accused of assaulting him and torturing him to death.
Three of the accused were found guilty of culpable homicide: the keep commander Jose Manuel Martins (28) was sentenced to eight years imprisonment, his second in command, Corporal Cuthbert Govesa (32) to seven years, Edward Muchiwa (47) was sentenced to four years and the fourth accused, Christopher Chimana (19) was found guilty of common assault and sentenced to three years (two suspended). They were all granted leave to appeal.
Before passing sentence, the former Chief Justice Acting Judge Sir Hugh Beadle, said it was "the worst case of culpable homicide that I have ever tried during my whole career." During the trial the court heard that Vesi Chibaya had been accused of stealing R$52 from a teacher's house. Someone else was later found to be responsible for the theft. The Guard Force men were alleged to have assaulted and tortured Mr Chibaya for two days and then tied him to a tree where he was found dead the next day. They had repeatedly ducked his head in a bucket of water to force a "confession" out of him, and had beaten him with a hosepipe. They had also tied his hands and legs to the pillars of a water tower in a position described by witnesses as "like a frog".
The acting judge said the court was satisfied that Martins ordered most of the assaults. Martins admitted administering electric shocks and had been present at the last beating of Mr Chibaya on 20 April and had sprinkled salt on Mr Chibaya's body. The acting judge said Govesa and Muchiwa were not coerced by Martins but were enthusiastic participants.
Two members of the security forces who committed what a Bulawayo magistrate called "brutal and senseless" assaults on tribesmen in the Tjlototjo area were each jailed for 15 months on 6 June 1979. The men, Ian Charles Soutter (27) and Morgeas Nay Naidoo (20) were found guilty of assault with intent to do grievous bodily harm.
Giving evidence against the men, Mr Francis Ncube said when he found soldiers assaulting people at his father's store he went and reported it to the police. When he returned to the store, Soutter struck him with a gun butt and asked why he had called the police. Later Soutter shot him in the leg near his house. Naidoo then took Mr. Ncube to the local hospital. While he was lying on a stretcher being treated by a medical assistant, Naidoo struck him about the head and body with his rifle butt for several minutes. He then took a pair of surgical scissors and cut Mr Ncube on the chest, causing superficial wounds. A doctor who tried to intervene was threatened by Naidoo who pointed his rifle at him.
The magistrate said on sentencing the men that he was satisfied that they had assaulted Mr Ncube, and that the assault was "completely unjustified." He said both men were in an operational area that was "heavily infiltrated by terrorists" and were off duty.
Two district assistants who beat up a man because he had no registration certificate were sentenced to five years' imprisonment after being convicted on 6 June in the Bulawayo Regional Court of culpable homicide. The two convicted men are Jotham Masuku (23) and Jeffrey Ndlovu (32).
The court was told that the two accused took Mr Mpala off a bus at the Lupane business centre because he had no registration certificate. Masuku admitted he hit Mr Mpala "many times" with a gun butt. The next day Mr Mpala reported what had happened to Lupane Police Station. He was then taken to St Luke's hospital where he died the same day.
What is noteworthy here is that in two of these cases the victim died and yet the accused were not convicted of murder, even though the presiding officers in the court found them guilty of unjustified assaults and torture which led directly to the deaths of their victims.
A perhaps even more alarming case is that of a white farmer, also a police reservist, who admitted flogging a black woman with a rhinoceros hide whip while interrogating her. He was found not guilty of assault.
The man, Robin Everard Hulme, appeared in the Salisbury Regional Court in June 1979 charged with indecently assaulting a woman in the Mangwende Tribal Trust Land in January. Hulme admitted that he struck the woman on the body with a whip but denied that this constituted indecent assault. Evidence was led that the woman, who is married with three children, was forced to undress and was then whipped on different parts of her body. Her husband told the court that he was working in a field near his home when his wife came running to him after the assault. She was distressed and her body was covered in weals. The injuries were mainly to the upper part of her back, her breasts and her thighs, he told the court.
The prosecutor said that as a member of the Police Reserve Hulme had been one of a "stick" of four mounted policemen who were following up a "terrorist contact" in the Mangwende TTL and they believed that the guerillas were hiding in the area where the complainant lived. The woman had denied knowledge of the whereabouts of guerillas, when questioned by Hulme. On 22 July the magistrate found Hulme not guilty.
