Last week, Mubaiwa was issued with a warrant of arrest
after she was brought to court in an ambulance and failed to climb the stairs
to the courtroom for her routine hearing.
She is battling life-threatening cancer which has severely
disfigured her right arm and fingers due to limited blood supply.
The former model is being charged with the attempted murder
of Chiwenga, while he was critically ill at a hospital in South Africa in 2019.
She is also accused of assaulting her former child minder,
Delight Munyoro.
On Wednesday during the National Assembly
question-and-answer session, Kuwadzana MP Johnson Matambo demanded that
Mutsvangwa, who was acting leader of government business in Parliament, must
explain government policy in terms of dragging very sick persons to court.
“We still see patients being dragged to answer criminal
charges against them when they are in a bad state. Legally, a critically ill
person or certified sick person cannot be brought to the courts. What is
government policy regarding the rights of patients, for example, the case of
Marry Mubaiwa-Chiwenga?” Munyoro asked Mutsvangwa.
The Information and Publicity minister shook her head
before she gave her response.
“I hope I got the question right. Government policy when it
comes to patients’ rights — whether they are bedridden or not is to make sure
that all patients are taken good care of,” Mutsvangwa said. Opposition Members
of Parliament (MPs) interjected fiercely saying Mutsvangwa failed to do justice
to the question.
Mbizo legislator Settlement Chikwinya said it would have
been prudent for the courts to go to a bed-ridden person.
“When a person is critically ill, it is the courts that
must go to the bed-ridden person? For
instance, in the case of Marry Mubaiwa — was the court not supposed to go to her?”
he asked.
Mutsvangwa could not immediately respond to the issue and
she requested the question to be put in writing.
“Chikwinya is asking a specific question, of which he
already knows the answer to it, and that is why I kindly ask him to put his question
in writing,” she said. Newsday
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