Two elderly white Zimbabwean farmers Mike Cambell (75), his wife Angela (70) who made history by taking the Robert Mugabe regime to a SADC Tribunal over land where on Monday found by the road side at Mount Carmel Farm in the Chegutu district with severe injuries. Their son-in-law, Ben Freeth was with them.
The three were found along a stretch of road on Monday after they were kidnapped and beaten.
The kidnapping took place at the time of Robert Mugabe’s re-inauguration as president on Sunday.
Police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena said 16 people have been arrested over the attacks and 20 others are being sought. He blamed the violence on “common criminality”.
A family friend Sue Marland on Tuesday night said the three were taken to an indoctrination camp after being kidnapped from their farm.
Their crime was for lodging a landmark case in December last with the SADC tribunal in Namibia.
Their attackers wanted them to withdraw the case..
Mike made history in December last year when he asked the tribunal in Windhoek to rule on the seizure of his farm, on which he had been since 1974.
This was the first time the tribunal had been approached to make this kind of decision.
The tribunal issued an interim order forbidding the Zimbabwean government from laying a hand on Campbell or his property until the Zimbabwean High Court could hear the matter.
Fourteen farmers in the Kadoma/Chegutu community spearheaded the applications with the Campbell Mount Carmel case in SADC.
Mike has serious concussion and a broken collar bone and fingers. Angela has a broken arm, in two places. Ben has a badly swollen and totally closed eye and feet severely beaten.
Mike was also attacked last November by armed men on his Mount Carmel farm in the Chegutu district.