National youth service training - Solidarity Peace Trust

implicit powers to mount roadblocks, disrupt MDC rallies, and intimidate voters. This role of the youth
militia has been documented in relation to the Presidential Election, the Rural Dis trict Council
Elections, parliamentary by-elections, and most recently in the Urban Council Elections.
Other activities documented in this report, include the role played at times by youth militia in
politicisation of government food distribution through the control of Grain Marketing Board (GMB)
sales. Youth militia have also been implicated in denial of access to health care on politically partisan
grounds, and in destruction of independent newspapers. Accounts of youth militia being implicated in
theft, vandalism and usurping the powers of law enforcing agencies are multiple.
The militia have an ambivalent relationship with law enforcing agencies including the army and police.
On the whole, the youth militia have impunity, often working under the direction of war veterans and
alongside government agencies in their illegal activities. They are seldom arrested or prevented from
breaking the law. However, there are a few cases on record of the youth militia attacking police or
army, and being attacked or arrested in return. The courts have also at times condemned their activities
and passed judgement against them.
Apart from having committed crimes against their fellow Zimbabweans, including family and
neighbours, the youth militia have themselves become victims of human rights abuses in the course of
their training. In terms of international law, to train anyone militarily under the age of 18 years, is to
create a child soldier. Government policy has on several occasions indicated the catchment for militia
training as being those between 10 and 30 years old. While an overall record of the numbers and ages
of youth trained is not publicly available, ad hoc information confirms that children as young as 11
years of age have been through the militia training.
Conditions in the training camps are confirmed to be severe; particularly in the first year of
implementation, rampant sexual activity among youth militia themselves was widely reported. Female
youth militia have reported rape on a systematic basis in some camps, involving girls as young as 11
years of age. Youth militia pregnancies, and sexually transmitted infections including HIV, have been
reported as resulting from youth militia training experiences from a variety of sources in the last two
years. Camp instructors are commonly implicated as among the rapists.
While some youth who have been through the militia training are reported to be well satisfied with
their experiences, others have fled the camps and even the nation in order to escape. Some youth
militia show signs of severe depression and guilt as a result of what they have seen and done.
Conclusion
The implications of the current youth militia training for Zimbabwe are serious indeed. The legitimacy
of providing politically partisan and military training to tens of thousands of youths every year must be
questioned. Against which enemy is this enormous “reserve force” of teenagers to be deployed? To
date their targets have been their fellow Zimbabwean citizens, particularly those perceived to support
the MDC. The social fabric has been deliberately destroyed through encouraging part of the nation’s
youth to commit terrible crimes against their fellow citizens with impunity. Even if youth militia
training were to stop tomorrow, it would leave Zimbabwe with a tough legacy. Our youths have been
turned into vandals and have become a lost generation in the process. The task of reintegrating youth
militia into the very communities they have victimised is as necessary as it is daunting.
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