Wellington Chibebe and Lovemore Matombo are the leaders of the Zimbabwean union federation, the ZCTU. They were arrested after a May Day rally for ‘spreading falsehoods prejudicial to the state’ (ie: telling the truth) and Mugabe is trying to silence them in the run up to the run off of the presidential election, with a trial on Monday that could go badly for them, and a ban on appearing in public or making public statements.

The TUC and others have an extremely ambitious plan to try to make a giant photo mosaic of Lovemore and Wellington, made up of hundreds and hundreds of tiny pics of supporters’ faces from around the world. Wellington and Lovemore may be banned from appearing in public, but this is a nice way for thousands of people to show solidarity and help them to “appear” at the London demo called to conincide with their trial on Monday, and in other demos that will be happening around the world. The plan is to use the picture to get more attention on the issue and demos in the media.

There are only 3 days to get hold of all the photos, so this is going to be ludicrously difficult. Your face is needed! If you have a mugshot you’d like to see as part of a giant mosaic, please email it (right now) to zim@tuc.org.uk or MMS a quick cameraphone snap to 07546 229055 (0044 7546 229055 internationally).

Please do help out. I’ve met both of them in the past and they are extremely brave people, going voluntarily into their trials on Monday, even though they are no strangers to being savagely beaten in custody. Anything that can be done to help them is a big big good!

And if you’re in town on Monday – the demo will be here. More info on the mosaic stuff here too.