HARARE (AFP) — An opposition MP was among more than 70 people to have been arrested in Zimbabwe's southwestern Buhera district after attacks on liberation war veterans and ruling party activists, police said Monday.
Eric Matinenga, who won the seat of Buhera West in parliamentary elections on March 29, was arrested on Saturday for inciting political violence, national police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena said in a statement.
Bvudzijena said the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) lawmaker was arrested after he addressed a meeting "at which he thanked youth for unleashing a reign of terror on war veterans and ZANU-PF supporters in Buhera."
"He is accused of having sponsored the youths to carry out acts of violence and on the day of his arrest he was paying the youths," Bvudzijena said.
"He is still in custody in Buhera while investigations are in progress."
Deputy police commissioner-general Levy Sibanda had earlier told the state-run Herald daily during a visit to Buhera that more than 70 suspects had been arrested over recent outbreaks of violence.
Six veterans of the 1970s liberation war and officials from President Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe African National Union - Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) party were injured following attacks by unidentified people last week.
Violence broke out in mostly rural parts of Zimbabwe following the announcement of the parliamentary results from the March elections which saw ZANU-PF lose its majority for the first time in 28 years.
The MDC claims over 50 of its supporters have been killed, hundreds injured and at least 25,000 displaced in retributive attacks in the aftermath of the polls.
The ruling party blames the violence on the MDC and Mugabe, who faces MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai in a presidential run-off on June 27, described the violence as "barbaric".
Matinenga is the fourth MDC lawmaker to be arrested since the elections. Arthur Mutambara, leader of a breakaway MDC faction, was also arrested on Sunday and is due to appear in court on Tuesday.
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