National strike begins in Zimbabwe
POSTED: 6:35 a.m. EDT, April 3, 2007
Story Highlights• Two-day strike called by unions to protest deepening economic hardships
• Police reaction force, water cannon trucks deployed in potential trouble spots
• Police spokesman says planned strike has been declared illegal
• Strike comes amid political crisis after opposition leaders beaten by police
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HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) -- Zimbabwean police and troops fanned out through impoverished townships Tuesday on the first day of a two-day national strike called to protest deepening economic hardships blamed on the government.

Police manned roadblocks across the capital. Four trucks carrying soldiers were seen headed to the southern town of Chitungwiza, 25 kilometers (15 miles) from Harare. Military helicopters flew over the nearby Epworth district.

Most downtown shops opened their doors. An electrical store kept one of its main entrance doors shut, a practice seen in previous strikes enabling businesses to close hurriedly in case of unrest. One bank was closed.

Police ordered township shops and bars to close early evening Monday as paramilitary police and water canon trucks were deployed, witnesses said.

There were no early reports of incidents or arrests. Commuter buses appeared to be operating normally with full loads of passengers.

A national reaction force of police and troops was sent to potential trouble spots, police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena said, according to state radio reports Tuesday morning.

The strike was a likely "avenue for acts of violence" by government opponents, he said.

Security measures were in place to keep schools open on the last day of the term before the Easter break, Information Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu told state radio.

He described the strike -- known as a stayaway with workers being urged to stay at home and not to take to the streets -- as "irrational."

The government was "doing all it could to address the current economic challenges facing the country," the radio station quoted him as saying.

The main Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions called the strike to protest the country's economic crisis, accusing the government of corruption and mismanagement that fueled official inflation of nearly 1,700 percent -- the highest rate in the world -- as well as 80 percent unemployment and acute shortages of food, hard currency and gasoline.

Labor unions planned no street demonstrations for fear of inciting police action.

On Monday, Bvudzijena said the planned strike had been declared illegal and police were being "strategically deployed" at bus stations, outside businesses and factories and at commuter transport ranks in townships to stop intimidation of workers by labor activists.

He said police would protect people going to work and "going about their legal business."

Executives at one Harare engineering plant said its workers planned to ignore the strike because the lunch provided in the canteen was the only daily meal they could rely on. Other workers feared that participating in the strike would lead to their pay being withheld.

Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai and top colleagues in the Movement for Democratic Change were hospitalized after being beaten by police while in custody last month after police violently stopped a Harare prayer meeting that had been declared an illegal political protest.

President Robert Mugabe has admitted that Tsvangirai and least 40 opposition activists were beaten in custody, and warned protesters they would be "bashed" again if violence continued -- a reference to government accusations that the opposition is to blame for a wave of unrest and petrol bomb attacks, allegations the opposition has repeatedly denied.

Fifteen opposition activists, nine of them ordered by a court to receive medical attention during the weekend for injuries allegedly inflicted by police, are scheduled to reappear in court Tuesday on violence-related charges, their lawyers said.