Reports of an emergency relief organization in Salisbury, covering the months of May and June 1979, provide a revealing commentary on the continuing deterioration of conditions in the martial law areas.
It is known that the flow of refugees from the war zones into Salisbury and Bulawayo, which halted during the April election period, has since increased sharply. People were unable to travel during the election period due to the intensity of the regime's preparations, involving the biggest military mobilization in the country's history. Since that time relief organizations have reported a drastic rise in the incidence of homes being burnt down, cattle and livestock confiscated, property destroyed and breadwinners missing.
Over the two-month period May/June, emergency relief in the form of food, clothing and blankets was distributed by this particular office to a total of 201 cases, each involving up to 20 or more families. In the overwhelming, majority of cases, those needing relief were destitute after their homes had been destroyed. Typical examples are:-
- Eight people in the Mount Darwin area who had been living in a protected village which was attacked. Granaries, blankets and clothes were destroyed.
- A family of seven people in the Mhondoro area. The father, who was an aspiring candidate in the April elections, was killed and the family fled from their home.
- A family of six in the Chikwaka TTL, whose home was set on fire by the security forces as a punitive measure for failing to report the presence of guerillas.
- A family of nine people in the Mangwende TTL whose home was destroyed after allegations that guerillas had been fed in their village.
- Six families, totalling 25 people, in the Mtoko area. Their homes were destroyed in a contact in which 40 people died.
- 24 families in the Mrewa area whose homes were set on fire soon after the April elections.
- 50 students from a mission in the Mrewa area whose blankets and clothes were taken during the holidays while security forces were in the mission.
These reports suggest a significant increase in the scale of security force operations against civilians, the ultimate aim of which has always been to root out and eliminate possible sources of support and assistance for the guerillas of the liberation movement. They also cast doubt on the suggestion made in the reports of the British team of observers from the Conservative Party, that the regulations governing martial law have been tightened up since its introduction, following reports of wanton destruction of property and other excesses by the security forces. Mr. John Drinkwater QC records in his report of the April elections that up to the end of 1978, martial law was interpreted to allow any officer of the rank of major or above to order the burning of huts or destruction of property. Since early 1979 however, this authority had been reduced, so that by April "no action (could) be taken without the express authority of the National Joint Operations Command in Salisbury". There had been "a considerable decline" in instances of hut burning, crop destruction and the confiscation of cattle as a result, according to Mr. Drinkwater. Lord Boyd reaches similar conclusions in his report.
