Nervy moments for Zimbabwe opposition leader

Nervy moments for Zimbabwe opposition leader

TSVANGIRAI

• Tvangirai trial closes in Harare

• Bizos: Menashe a liar

• Ncube testifies at Tsvangirai trial

• Tsvangirai grilled on Menashe deal

• Herald lies over treason trial

• Mugabe was my hero - Tsvangirai

• Tsvangirai takes witness stand

• Tsvangiai calls for coalition

• Mugabe pulls Zim out of C'nwealth

By Staff Reporter

MORGAN Tsvangirai prepared for the worst this week as news came through that the High Court had postponed indefinitely a judgement on his year-long treason trial.

Tsvangirai, leader of Zimbabwe's opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) is accused of plotting to kill President Robert Mugabe with the help of a former Israeli spy who was the prosecution's key witness.

MDC spokesman Paul Themba Nyathi told New Zimbabwe.com that the judgement which was supposed to be delivered next Thursday had been held back after assessors in the case - Misheck Nyandoro and Joseph Dangarembizi - asked for a review of the judgement after expressing "concerns".

A legal expert told New Zimbabwe.com that the latest hitch with the case most definitely meant it was a guilty verdict by Justice Paddington Garwe.

"It's not common to get to this scenario but my observation is that it doesn't look promising for Tsvangirai," the lawyer said.

Nyathi insisted that Tsvangirai was unfazed and remained "100 percent certain of his innocence" and will lead the opposition party into the next elections.

Tsvangirai was charged with treason in February last year for allegedly plotting to assassinate Mugabe ahead of the 2002 presidential election.

The charges hinge on a secretly videotaped meeting between Tsvangirai and Ari Ben-Menashe, president of a Canadian-based public relations firm, Dickens and Madison, in which the idea of "eliminating" Mugabe was brought up.

Defence lawyers have argued since the opening of the trial that the videotape on which the alleged plot to assassinate Mugabe was based was defective and could not be relied on.

Tsvangirai, a former union leader who formed the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in 1999 to challenge Mugabe, says the government trumped up the treason charges against him in a bid to frame and discredit him ahead of a presidential election in 2002.

He lost the elections, which were discredited by international observers who said they were rigged and marred by political violence.

Tsvangirai said he had hired Ben Menashe's firm to help with international lobbying and fundraising for his party, but later discovered the government had also hired it.
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