Trade Unions Congress

Support Zimbabwean trade unionists on trial!

Just days before the Presidential run-off election, Lovemore Matombo and Wellington Chibebe, President and General Secretary of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) will be in court to face charges of 'spreading falsehoods prejudicial to the state' - or rather, telling the truth about violence in Zimbabwe. As part of their bail conditions they have been banned from addressing political or public gatherings for almost the whole election campaign. These charges and bail conditions are clear breaches of free speech and freedom to associate.

We are urging people everywhere to protest at attempts to silence these men, and at the state-sponsored violence and intimidation which has intensified since the first round of elections in March.

If Lovemore and Wellington aren't able to address a public gathering themselves, you can help them to with this campaign action, but you'll need to hurry. We are making a giant photo mosaic of Lovemore and Wellington, using pictures of hundreds of their supporters from around the world - and we want to use your photo as one tiny part of it. We'll get this printed on a large banner as a focus for the London demonstration on 23 June, and will make the image available to other international demonstrations and to the media.

This is a last minute campaign, so we need to get your photos in immediately. There are two ways to do this:

Take a photo of yourself with your digital camera and email it to [email][email protected] Take a photo of yourself with your cameraphone and send it by MMS to 07546 229055 (0044 7546 229055 from outside the UK).

We'll do the work to make the photo mosaics and you'll be able to see the result here at the end of the week. If you're able, please take photos of your friends and colleagues as well, and send all of those to us in the same way - the more the merrier.

For more information, click here