HARARE – An organisation representing workers in the agricultural sector on Monday launched a scathing video report highlighting human rights abuses that took place on Zimbabwe’s commercial farms between 2008 and 2009.

General Agriculture and Plantation Workers Union of Zimbabwe (GAPWUZ) spokesperson Tapiwa Zivira told ZimOnline on Tuesday that the 26-minute video titled “House of Justice” highlights some of the worst abuses against farm workers in the wake of the controversial land reform programme launched by President Robert Mugabe’s government in 2000.

“The report features the gory acts of what has been happening on the farms throughout the country since last year,” said Zivira.

“It exposes the human rights violations which are still being committed by marauding mobs and some senior politicians against farm workers. The report also urges regional bodies such as the Southern African Development Community and African Union to look into the plight of these people and urge the government of Zimbabwe to respect the rule of law.”

GAPWUZ said several government officials from the ministries of home affairs, agriculture and national healing who were invited to the event did not turn up.

“Only a representative of Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai came but we would have wanted the government officials to see for themselves the abuses on the farms,” said Zivira.

The organisation will next week host a regional launch of the report in Johannesburg, South Africa.

GAPWUZ also launched at the same occasion another report titled "Is something wrong", which highlights how Zimbabwe's chaotic and often violent land reform programme has affected farm workers since 2000.

Individual workers give testimonies on how they were affected by the farm seizures which were spearheaded by mobs of war veterans and ZANU PF party supporters.

The report also highlights how labour laws and basic human rights of farm workers have been violated. It also contains evidence of people who were beaten up, harassed and sometimes shot at by Mugabe's militia under the guise of redistributing arable land previously in the hands of whites.

Fresh farm disturbances in Zimbabwe have reportedly rendered over 4 000 farm workers homeless since the formation last February of the unity government by Mugabe and his once bitter rival Tsvangirai.

The decade-long farm invasions which the 85-year-old Mugabe says were necessary to ensure blacks also had access to arable land that they were denied by previous white-led governments have been blamed for plunging Zimbabwe into food shortages.