FORMER Highfield legislator Munyaradzi Gwisai and five
other activists who were six years ago convicted for conspiring to commit
public violence, with a view to remove former President Robert Mugabe from
power, “the Egyptian way”, yesterday walked out of the High Court in high
spirits after both their conviction and sentence were quashed.
The decision by High Court judges of appeal, Justices
Charles Hungwe and Neville Wamambo followed an appeal by Gwisai, Hopewell
Gumbo, Welcome Zimuto, Antoneta Choto, Tatenda Mombeyarara and Edson Chakuma
who had been fined $500 each and ordered to perform 420 hours of community
service by the late magistrate Kudakwashe Jarabini in March 2012.
The State had alleged the offence was committed on February
19, 2011at the Zimbabwe Labour Centre, at 43 Julius Nyerere Way in Harare where
Gwisai works as co-ordinator of the International Socialist Organisation (ISO).
It was alleged his accomplices agreed to mobilise people to
revolt against the government and demand the resignation of Mugabe in the
manner Egyptians had deposed their president Hosni Mubarak.
The six labour activists, had been arrested by Mugabe’s
regime during a meeting at which they were watching video footages of mass
uprisings that had occurred in Egypt and Tunisia in 2011.
But, through their lawyer Alec Muchadehama the six had
argued that presiding magistrate Jarabini erred in convicting them given that
the evidence presented in court had not established the commission of the
alleged offence.
However, when the matter was presented in court yesterday,
Prosecutor-General (PG) representative Edmore Nyazamba, on behalf of the State,
conceded that the State had no reason to oppose the six suspect’s grounds of
appeal, a move that was applauded by the court.
Nyazamba told the court that the evidence that had been
presented during the trial by the State’s star witness, one Detective Jonathan
Shoko, did not establish conspiracy to commit a crime given that Shoko
confirmed that when Gwisai and his colleague’s meeting was disrupted, they had
not made any resolutions.
In their appeal, the suspects had also argued that the
Tunisian and Egyptian uprisings videos were shown to kill time but the
magistrate had erred in holding that they were shown to arouse feelings of
hostility.
After the quashing of the proceedings, Gwisai said justice
had been done and the court had vindicated them.
“Today the court has vindicated us. In November 2017,
history vindicated what we stood for.
We still stand where we stood and affirm that the removal
of Mugabe is not the removal of dictatorship.
We call on the people of Zimbabwe to finish what they
started and confine this junta to the dustbin of history and never again should
the people of Zimbabwe allow one man, family and party to ruin this country,” Gwisai
said. Newsday
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