Treason hearing to open on March 21

Socialist Munyaradzi Gwisai, a University of Zimbabwe labour law lecturer who heads the International Socialist Organisation, and seven rights activists are charged with plotting to overthrow Mugabe in an Egypt-style uprising.

Out of the 46 who appeared in court on Monday, 38 were released after the state concurred with defence arguments that they had no case to answer.

Police armed with AK-47s, shotguns and batons surrounded Harare magistrates court as Gwisai and his accomplices heard the formal reading of charges and was remanded into police custody until March 21. They arrived in a convoy of armoured vehicles.

The State, represented by law officers Edmore Nyazamba and Dumisani Mthombeni said they will prove beyond reasonable doubt that Gwisai, Antonator Choto, and Tatenda Mombeyarara convened a meeting at number 43 Julius Nyerere Way in Harare for the purposes of plotting to overthrow a constitutionally-elected government together with five other officials.

The remaining eight, now on trial for their life for high treason, have rejected a conspiracy to overthrow Mugabe or stage a putsch. The law officers, while opposing bail alleged that they had feigned being in a church service when police busted their meeting. The State says it has a watertight case against the accused eight.

The high-profile treason trial has attracted international attention and the State insists that an overt act of treason had been committed, but human rights lawyer Alec Muchadehama says even if there was a suggestion of a “discussion” of it, that was not sufficient to lead to a conviction.

Muchadehama has dismissed the State’s arguments, saying it showed no explicit reference to the overthrow of government by unconstitutional means. “If watching television footage of the uprisings was treason, most Zimbabweans would be guilty of it because we watch news daily,” Muchadehama said.

The accused say they have been tortured and brutalised in custody, and denied medical attention. The court has already ruled that a full probe into the torture be instituted.

The court on Monday ordered that the eight social and human rights activists be jailed for almost month while waiting to stand trial on the treason charge pressed against them. The activists’ other attorney, Charles Kwaramba, protested to the magistrate that his clients must be removed from solitary confinement. They have been held in at Chikurubi Maximum Security Prison where they are on lock down for 23 hours, while the women were being forced to work at the prison even though they have not been convicted.

“We seriously object to this,” Kwaramba said. “They are still innocent and there is no need to punish them. Their right of liberty is being seriously infringed. That amounts to slavery. It must not be allowed in a democratic society.”

US State Department spokesman Philip J. Crowley has called on the government of Zimbabwe to uphold rights spelled out under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and to ensure that those arrested are guaranteed due process.

The arrests have drawn international condemnation, including from the United Nations which urged Harare to guarantee its citizens freedom of expression and freedom of assembly under Zimbabwean and international law. The UN rights chief Navi Pillay has said the arrests were a “step back.”