Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) officers deployed in the Harare Gardens are reportedly extorting money from citizens for allegedly not wearing face masks properly.
A woman who spoke to The Mirror said she was in a group of 15 people arrested and taken to a Police base in the gardens at around 9 am on Monday and were forced to pay US$5 in bribes.
She said they were detained for 2 hours inside a Police post on the pretext that a lorry would come and ferry them to Harare Central Police Station where they would pay fines.
However, no police truck came to take them and they were eventually called outside the Police post one by one and released on paying a bribe, the woman alleged.
National Police Spokesperson Assistant Commissioner Paul Nyathi said a team has been dispatched to Harare Gardens to investigate the matter but said he suspected the victims were swindled by fake cops.
The victim further told The Mirror that she was supposedly arrested for violating coronavirus regulations, something which she claimed the police officers were also guilty of. She said:
I am so disgusted and shocked by the rogue behaviour of the Police that I am ready to identify the culprits if a professional parade is to be put together…
Those cops were so rude and menacing you don’t understand why they are so angry. A female cop said her speciality in the force is to torture and beat up suspects.
What surprised us is that the officers arrested us for allegedly violating Covid-19 regulations but the Police base where we were taken to had no sanitisers, the cops had no masks and there was no social distance.
When we asked them about those, they got angry.
Police and soldiers are paid far much more than other government employees such as teachers, nurses and doctors.