Election observers oppose remand placement
Electoral Resource Centre (ERC) and Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN) who were raided and arrested on election day contend that their arrest was unlawful and are challenging their remand placement.
The state alleges that the observers attempted to run parallel vote tabulation in order to announce the election results ahead of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC).
The ruling on the remand challenge has been set down for 6 October.
The observers complained of mistreatment during and after their arrest, to which the court ordered the state to investigate. Investigations were supposed to have been completed by 7 September 2023 but this was not done, according to their lawyer.
“We made the complaint to the court, the court ordered that the state investigate those complaints and provide a report to the court today.
“We want the state to produce that report for purposes of complying with that court order,” said lawyer Alec Muchadehama
He also complained that his clients did not even know who the witnesses in their case were even though part of their bail conditions included that they should not interfere with witnesses.
“It seems like the state has no witness, it was going to be easier if the state said don’t interfere with A, B and C,” he said.
Muchadehama prayed the court to remove his clients from remand on account of the state failing to state reasons for remand.
“The accused should be removed from remand because of the delay, the state did not answer the question why the accused should be on remand. As the law says that every remand must be justified,” Muchadehama argued.
However, Prosecutor, Pardon Dziva said investigations were ongoing.
“As we speak, we are still investigating, the current position is that we are not in possession of that report,” Dziva said.
According to Muchadehama, the observers were tortured before they were brought to court. He also said they were placed in stinking cells with no blankets.
“They were held incommunicado. Upon being taken illegally, the police seized each of the accused persons’ personal cell phones, asked for the passwords, switched them off and put some on flight mode before they took them away.
“They were not able to communicate with their spouses, relatives, legal practitioners, doctors or anyone else.
“This is a clear violation of the Constitution which prescribes that an accused person must be able to communicate with the outside world upon arrest,” said Muchadehama.
The observers were released on $200 bail each last month.
