A report from the organisation’s Africa Division has found that police fired indiscriminately at protesters, who were voicing their discontent over alleged police brutality, and the impunity surrounding the death of a university student.
Dozens were killed and hundreds left injured during the demonstrations, which started off peacefully. Nomathamsanqa Masiko-Mpaka, who is the author of the report, says people’s lives have been permanently altered, yet no action has been taken.
“People are far worse now. The individuals we interviewed have lost their limbs and therefore are unable to work. Many of them were breadwinners in their families and now they can’t work.
Some have lost breadwinners in their family, they’ve lost loved ones, they’ve lost sense of certain movement in their arms, they can’t work and their lives have effectively been altered. And whenever somebody’s life is altered, especially at the hands of the government, there ought to be remedies and really, that was our concern.
And moreover, when we spoke to some of these victims, particularly ahead of the initial start of the research, many of them were talking about how the government wanted to wish away what happened,” she said.
–SABC–
