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(NEWZIMBAWE) Gwisai, five others escape with fines

Gwisai, five others escape with fines
21/03/2012 00:00:00
by AP

SIX civic activists including former MP Munyaradzi Gwisai were on Wednesday fined US$500 each and ordered to do community service for conspiring to commit public violence.

Gwisai, Antonater Choto, 36, Tatenda Mombeyarara, 29, Edson Chakuma, 38, Hopewell Gumbo, 32, and Welcome Zimuto, 25, were convicted on Monday of the plot which unravelled after they were arrested during a meeting in which they watched video footage of mass uprisings in Egypt that toppled its longtime ruler.

Harare magistrate Kudakwashe Jarabini ordered the six to carry out 420 hours of community service or face a year in jail. He suspended another 12 months imprisonment on condition they don't commit another similar offence.
The group was arrested last year for holding a meeting it said was an academic lecture on democratic rights.

Jarabini found the activists guilty on Monday, saying that while watching a video was not a crime, the "manner and motive" of the February 2011 meeting showed bad intent.

He ruled that showing footage of uprisings in both Tunisia and Egypt that included "nasty scenarios" was intended to arouse hostility toward Zimbabwe's government.

The activists had faced a maximum prison sentence of up to ten years. Original charges of treason carrying a possible death sentence were dropped in months of legal wrangling.

Police had arrested 45 people who attended the meeting at a Harare hotel but 39 were later released after judicial officials said police mounted a "dragnet" campaign against alleged participants.
Gwisai, the outspoken radical leader of the International Socialist Organisation in Zimbabwe, is a former MDC MP for Highfield.

Gwisai and other members of the group complained earlier they were tortured by police and beaten with wooden planks and iron bars. They said they were also told to confess that they called for the ouster of longtime Zimbabwe ruler President Robert Mugabe, 88.

Labels: COURTS, MUNYARADZI GWISAI, TREASON

posted by MrK @ 5:59 PM