THE son of Midlands governor Jason Machaya and three other Zanu PF activists were beginning 18-year jail terms on Monday after they were convicted of beating an MDC-T supporter to death.
Bulawayo High Court judge Justice Nicholas Mathonsi, on circuit in Gweru, said the sentence should send a “clear message on the sanctity of life” as he put away Farai Machaya, 32, Abel Maphosa, and brothers Edmore, 29, and Bothwell Gana, 27, for the killing of Moses Chokuda in March 2009.
Two soldiers, Obert Gavi, 25, and Tirivashoma Mawadza, 25, involved in the brutal assault on Chokuda, who had been accused of a break-in at the governor’s shop in Gokwe, were given suspended 12 month sentences.
In dramatic scenes outside the Gweru Magistrates’ Court building where the sentencing hearing took place, Chokuda’s father declared he would not be burying his son until the parents of the quartet “come to my own court”.
“I will not be consoled by 18 years. What is 18 years when people committed such kind of crime? I will not bury my son. This is only the beginning,” vowed Tavengwa Chokuda, whose son’s body remains unclaimed at the Gokwe District Hospital mortuary.
He added: “Parents of these boys should come forward so that we talk. They should come to my own court where my own people can amicably settle this matter.”
Despite the political undertones which have dominated the case, prosecutors insisted that the case was purely criminal.
The trial, which opened on September 14, heard how Machaya, Maphosa and tyhe Gana brothers drove to Chokuda’s home in rural Gokwe on March 22, 2009, and accused him of robbing Machaya’s shop at Gokwe Centre.
The four had enlisted the services of the two soldiers to intimidate Chokuda, but it was they who led the assault with logs and booted feet, leaving him for dead. An autopsy report prepared for the court revealed that Chokuda died from fractures on his cervical spine. He had sustained several injuries all over his body.
Justice Mathonsi said the four had taken the law into their own hands, when they could have reported the break-in at a police station 3km away.
The judge told the four: “This is unacceptable. Instead of reporting the burglary matter to the police 3km away, you hired soldiers of fortune, who in turn assaulted the deceased.
“The four of you proceeded to assault the deceased and in the process you abducted people and masqueraded as police officers and members of the army. A sentence that sends a clear message on the sanctity of life and the need to uphold the law is necessary.”