He narrated his ordeal at the hands of the spy agents to The Zimbabwean this week and dismissed earlier reports that he had been beaten up by unknown thugs.
Chiyangwa was recently discovered unconscious outside Fidelity Building where he usually parks his car.
He said the operatives wanted to force him to conceal details of a gold scam in which he is likely to be a key witness in an ongoing case at the Bulawayo magistrates court.
Chiyangwa, a security consultant who owns J Security Services, said his ordeal started when he was approached by a mine that wanted his help to investigate suspected gold theft.
“Management at Old Nic Mine suspected their gold was being siphoned out because production had dwindled from about three kg a day to less than one or sometimes nothing. So we set undercover investigators and we managed to help in the arrest of 14 suspects whom we found with 426g of gold,” he said. The suspects are in custody and await trial expected on February 25.
“Days after, I was approached by a CIO operative called Kadzire and he accused me of having handed over the gold suspects to police. He told me that the suspects were Zanu (PF) supporters whom the CIO were eating with and hence I was supposed to help withdraw the case as we belonged to one party. However, I refused,” said Chiyangwa.
On February 3, he was called by a lady called Nhongo who invited him to the CIO Bulawayo headquarters at Magnet House. “Upon arrival I was received by a woman operative who slapped me in the face and asked who I thought I was. Three other women then dragged me into a nearby room where there were already four men. They undressed me while beating me thoroughly with electric cables.
“I have an artificial limb because I am disabled from the knee. They removed it and used the cables to assault me on the remaining half of the leg. When they realised that my screaming was going to attract attention of the people passing outside the building, they gagged me with a cloth and pulled me into my Toyota Prado vehicle which was parked outside,” he said. He was blindfolded and driven in his car in an unknown direction – still being beaten.
Throughout the ordeal, he said, they kept pressuring him to ensure that the case was withdrawn before going to trial, threatening him with further harm if he did not succeed. “After about an hour of the torture, one of them told his colleagues that it was now too much and that if I died, it was going to be tough for them. They then brought me back to the (Fidelity Building) and left me for dead. I was unconscious for some time and when I woke up I phoned my daughter but I could not talk. She then drove to the office looking for me and took me to hospital.”
The Zanu (PF) chairman vowed to ensure that he testifies in the gold case so that those who were behind the theft face justice. Chiyangwa also stated that he strongly believes the CIO operatives who tortured him are the ones who gave a dummy story to the media that it was thugs who had beaten him. Media reports which dwelt on the story quoted unnamed sources saying the famous businessman had been assaulted by thugs who wanted to rob him. Other reports went on to mention that the thugs who beat him had been hired by his business associates who had been irked by a deal which went sour.
Post published in: News