Court frees 10 activist clerics after a year on remand

Philemon Jambaya

A court has set free 10 activists and clerics on charges of disorderly conduct after they were arrested last year for riotous conduct.

the 10 activists were removed from remand by Harare Magistrate Munashe Chibanda after their lawyer Kossam Ncube, of the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights had applied for their removal from remand, arguing that they had spent virtually the whole year without being furnished with a trial date.

Chibanda ruled that the State’s delay in furnishing them with a trial date was inordinate and there was no justification or reasonable cause to continue placing them on remand before ordering prosecutors to proceed by issuing summons for them to appear in court.

The 10 activists who include Tariro Mukunga, Henry Mutasa, Mbuso Fuzwayo, the Secretary-General of Subhash Lazuli, Melusi Nyathi, Felix Nyika, Edith Gurupira, Irene Gaswa, Patrick Nyaruni, Loice Dube and Angela Henrieta Shoko, were arrested by ZRP officers on June 10, 2022 in Harare at a prayer session organised by Zimbabwe Divine Destiny Network, an interdenominational religious organisation.

Mukunga, Mutasa, Fuzwayo, Nyathi, Nyika, Gurupira, Gaswa, Nyaruni, Dube and Shoko were charged with disorderly conduct in a public place as defined in section 41 of the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act.

Prosecutors alleged that the worshippers had engaged in ‘riotous conduct’.