Harare | Wednesday
TWO Zimbabwe opposition members told a court in the country’s second city of Bulawayo that they were tortured to confess to the murder of a ruling party stalwart, press reports said on Wednesday.
War veteran leader Cain Nkala was abducted from his Bulawayo home in early November by unknown gunmen. His body was found a week later in a shallow grave outside the city. He had been strangled with his own shoelaces.
The government of President Robert Mugabe has accused the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) of being behind the murder.
Veterans of Zimbabwe’s independence war and groups of youths have backed Mugabe’s governing party in electioneering and by occupying white-owned farms in sometimes violent operations accompanying a land reform campaign.
Remember Moyo, an MDC member, said he was arrested in Gweru, central Zimbabwe, on November 12, and severely assaulted for three days by police, both the private Daily News and the state-run Herald reported.
Moyo told the court that he signed a statement “confessing” to Nkala’s murder after he was threatened with further torture, but denies any actual involvement, the Daily News said.
In a Herald report on Tuesday, Sibanda claimed he was arrested along with Moyo, and physically assaulted by police.
Sibanda and Moyo were testifying in a bail application hearing for Simon Spooner, one of 14 MDC suspects being held by police over the murder.
Both papers reported on Wednesday that Sibanda showed the court bite marks on his wrists, and claimed Nkala bit him as he was being kidnapped.
But Spooner’s lawyer, advocate Tim Cherry, told AFP via telephone from Bulawayo that Sibanda made no admission to murder.
Meanwhile, many of the country’s commercial farmers, forced off their farms by a controversial government land resettlement exercise, continue to seek land in Mozambique, a senior government official said Wednesday.
“We expect a significant number of Zimbabwean farmers to start working in the central province of Manica early next year,” said Agriculture and Rural Development Minister Helder Muteia.
Muteia said between 70 and 80 Zimbabwean applications had been approved.
“We’re now waiting for them to bring in concrete investments,” he added.
At least 10 Zimbabwean farmers are already working in the fertile central Mozambican province, he said. He said the farmers would not receive more than 1 000 hectares of land each. – AFP