In response to a disturbing rise in repression of union leaders in Zimbabwe, AFT president Edward J. McElroy has sent a letter of protest to Robert Mugabe, the country's president. Earlier this month, the president and secretary general of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) were arrested, interrogated for six hours and jailed on the reported charge of "inciting people to rise against government."

"The AFT condemns the arrest and detention of these men and calls for their immediate release," McElroy wrote. "This deplorable incident is part of a long pattern of injustice against Zimbabweans—many of whom who are teachers and trade unionists—seeking to exercise their political rights."

In another development, the AFT learned after McElroy's letter had been sent that Raymond Majongwe, the secretary general of the Progressive Teachers' Union of Zimbabwe, also had been arrested. Majongwe was apprehended by the police at the High Court of Zimbabwe in Harare on May 16 while he was attending the bail hearing of Lovemore Matombo and Wellington Chibebe, the ZCTU's president and secretary general.

"This year," McElroy wrote to Mugabe, "the world community marks the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and its later associated covenants, of which Zimbabwe is a signatory. In calling for the urgent release of Lovemore Matombo and Wellington Chibebe, we are demanding no less than your country's honoring its commitments to these international agreements. Zimbabwe must immediately and irrevocably guarantee all its citizens the right to fair protection under the law, and the freedoms of speech, association and political belief."

Education International also sent out an urgent appeal asking concerned educators to write to president Mugabe and other international officials.

May 22, 2008