Thread: Free Roy Bennet now!

S'true - laat die man gaan. Smaak my history is op sy kant. Peace.

Now RELEASE him!

Zimbabwe's Supreme Court Orders Release on Bail of Ministerial Designate Bennett
By Jonga Kandemiiri
Washington
11 March 2009

The Zimbabwean Supreme Court on Wednesday dismissed an appeal by the state against a High Court ruling granting bail to Roy Bennett, a senior official of the Movement for Democratic Change formation led by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai.

Chief Justice Godfrey Chidyausiku set bail of US$5,000, an increase from the US$2,000 set in the High Court decision appealed by prosecutors. Chidyausiku also ordered Bennett to report to the police three times a week and surrender property title deeds to the court.

Bennett, a former Zimbabwean commercial farmer and parliamentarian designated deputy agriculture minister by Mr. Tsvangirai, was arrested on Feb. 13 and is accused of possessing weapons for the purposes of terrorism, banditry and insurgency. The charges were brought in connection with a 2006 case in which a number of MDC officials were accused of plotting to assassinate President Robert Mugabe, but the case for the most part collapsed.

Bennett's arrest and the charges brought against him, which his lawyers and the MDC say are politically motivated, have been cited by Western countries as indicating that true reform in the domain of human rights, as in others, has yet to come about in Harare.

Bennett, held in the remand prison in the eastern city of Mutare for the past month, is due back in court on March 18 for further action in the case.

Bennett planned to travel to Harare to be sworn
in as deputy agriculture minister [EPA]

Story by Haru Mutasa, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Harare.

Zimbabwean authorities have released Roy Bennett, a Movement for Democratic Change official and designated state minister, from prison.
The release in the town of Mutare on Thursday comes a day after the country's supreme court ordered his release on bail on charges of "imposition of weapons".

Bennett told Al Jazeera after his release that the charges against him were an "absolute fabrication".

"And I've been framed in on the same thing. There is absolutely nothing there. There is no evidence," Bennett said.

Bennett had initially been charged with treason, but the charges were quickly replaced with accusations that he allegedly plotted to buy weapons to attack a telecommunications station in Bromley, east of the capital, Harare.

Bail conditions

He said he had to surrender his passport, report to a police office three times a week and hand over a deposit of US$5,000 as conditions for his bail.
Bennett said he was planning to go to Harare later on Thursday to be sworn in as deputy agriculture minister.

Morgan Tsvangirai, the prime minister and Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader, had nominated Bennett as deputy agriculture minister last month.

But Bennett was arrested before he could be sworn in as part of a new coalition government, of the MDC and President Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF.
Bennett's detention had raised doubts about the sustainability of the new unity government formed after almost a year of political turmoil.

Haru Mutasa, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Harare, the capital, said: "It isn't over for Roy Bennett. The trial is still continuing."
Bennett faces up to life in jail if convicted.

Read this an weep for the people languishing in Zimbabwe's fails:

Bailed Roy Bennett tells of horror conditions in Mugabe jail

Jan Raath in Mutare

Roy Bennett, one of the right-hand men of Zimbabwe's Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai - and an implacable opponent of President Mugabe - walked out of a squalid Zimbabwean jail yesterday.

The 51-year-old Deputy Agriculture Minister-designate was arrested a month ago - as Mr Mugabe was swearing in the Government's power-sharing Cabinet - on allegations of “banditry, sabotage and insurgency”.

Emerging from the gates of Mutare remand prison and struggling to hold back tears yesterday, he said that his incarceration had been “a harrowing experience”.

He said: “I would not wish it on my worst enemy. There are people there who look worse than the photographs of prisoners in Dachau and Auschwitz. They get a handful of sadza [thick maizemeal porridge] and water with salt. Five people died while I was there, and their bodies were collected after four or five days. There are people there who have been awaiting trial for three years.”

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Mr Bennett shared a small excrement-covered cell with 12 other men. “It breaks my heart when I think of them,” he said, adding that those responsible for the repression and ruin of the country over the past decade should “go on their knees and beg forgiveness” from God. However, he also urged Zimbabwe's new coalition Government to forget the past and work together to rebuild the shattered nation. “Conditions in that jail are brought about by hate. I bear no malice. In my heart, all I can do is move forward to build the country. If we don't forgive, and there isn't a spirit of forgiveness, we are going nowhere.

“There are people who don't want right to prevail, and want to keep believing that they have the power to do anything. But they are few and their time is near the end.”

Despite twice being granted bail by courts, state prosecutors - acting on instructions from Mr Mugabe's most senior officials - ensured that Mr Bennett remained in prison by appealing against the rulings to release him. Finally, on Wednesday, the Supreme Court upheld the earlier bail rulings and ordered Mr Bennett's release.

Observers said that the decision was almost certainly influenced by Mr Mugabe, and represented a growing realisation that the country's political environment was changing more rapidly than expected.

Mr Bennett is hated by the top echelon of Mr Mugabe's Zanu (PF) party, particularly the powerful coterie of military men close to the President, because he is a former white farmer and an ex-member of the Rhodesian security forces - and because he is popular with many black Zimbabweans. His command of the Shona language and knowledge of their customs means that they regard him as one of their own. The demeanour of the guards at the prison, which is close to Zimbabwe's eastern border with Mozambique, was a testament to how fast the mood in the country is evolving. One of them told me excitedly when I arrived at the gates: “Mr Bennett is getting out today. Yes, we are happy.”

Last week another guard asked officials of Mr Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change, who had taken Mr Bennett disinfectant to clean the cell, and some food, for 18 “Free Roy” T-shirts. “Ten for the day guards, and eight for the night guards,” he said.

Supporters of the Prime Minister's party, many of them wearing similar T-shirts, kept up a steady chorus of singing outside the rickety gates.

When prison officers lowered the flag outside the prison to mark a national day of mourning for a veteran Zanu (PF) official, the crowd chanted: “Susan, Susan, Susan” in honour of Mr Tsvangirai's wife, who was killed in a car crash a week ago.

After his release, Mr Bennett telephoned his wife Heather, in South Africa before leaving Mutare in a vehicle heading towards Mr Tsvangirai's rural home in the southeast of the country, where he planned to pay his respects to the grieving Prime Minister.

Mr Bennett is free. Let us move on. It is tired news this Zimbabwe.