Haruzivishe was convicted on Wednesday 31 March 2021 by Magistrate
Taruvinga on charges of inciting public violence and resisting arrest
by law enforcement agents, who on Tuesday 6 April 2021 sentenced him
to serve 36 months in jail. However, 16 months of his sentence were
suspended on condition that he does not commit the same offence and
gets convicted.
He had been arrested by ZRP officers on 5 February 2020 and charged
with inciting public violence and resisting arrest by law enforcement
agents. During trial, prosecutors alleged that Haruzivishe incited
some vendors to commit public violence by whistling to them when some
ZRP officers were on an operation to round up informal traders in
Harare’s central business district. Haruzivishe, the prosecutors
charged, also resisted arrest by some police officers who wanted to
apprehend him.
On the first count of incitement as defined in section 187 of the
Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act, Magistrate Taruvinga
sentenced Haruzivishe to serve 24 months in prison of which 10 months
were suspended for a period of five years.
On the second count of resisting a peace officer as defined in section
176 of the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act, the
pro-democracy campaigner was sentenced to serve 12 months of which six
months were suspended for a period of five years.
Haruzivishe, who was represented by Kossam Ncube and Obey Shava of
Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights, then appealed against both
conviction and sentence in 2021, where he argued that Magistrate
Taruvinga had grossly erred and misdirected herself in convicting him
and hence the guilty verdict handed down by the judicial officer
should be set aside.
After presiding over hearing of Haruzivishe’s appeal, Justice Benjamin
Chikowero and Justice Happias Zhou on 22 September 2022 quashed and
set aside the pro-democracy campaigner’s conviction and sentence by
Magistrate Taruvinga after finding him not guilty on both counts and
consequently acquitted him.
Justice Chikowero and Zhou had no kind words for Magistrate Taruvinga
whom they said had “fundamentally misdirected” herself in convicting
imprisoning Haruzivishe.
The two judges concluded that Magistrate Taruvinga’s ruling was not
“thorough” and that she had based her verdict on an “incorrect
appreciation of evidence” adduced during Haruzivishe’s trial and also
on patently “wrong facts”.