Defence lawyers in the treason trial of Zimbabwe opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai finished on Monday their cross-examination of the key state witness, who told the court the trial had wrecked his marriage.
The defence said they would apply to recall the witness, Ari Ben Menashe, after he is re-examined by the state lawyer. They accuse him of witholding information.
”We will submit that the witness has witheld important information,” chief defence lawyer George Bizos told the court.
Ben Menashe, a Canadian-based political consultant who also claims to be a decorated former member of Israeli military intelligence, has alleged that Tsvangirai requested his help in eliminating President Robert Mugabe ahead of presidential elections last year.
But last week the witness applied to be dismissed from the trial after he claimed both defence and state counsels were abusing him by prolonging his stint in the witness stand.
The application was turned down on the basis that both counsels would be finished with him by the middle of this week. Ben Menashe’s testimony hinges on a video tape he secretly made of a meeting with Tsvangirai at his firm, Dickens and Madson, in Montreal in December 2001.
Bizos said the information witheld by the witness included the true identity of one Edward Simms, who attended the Montreal meeting and is recorded on the video. Ben Menashe claims Simms is a member of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
Earlier on Monday, Ben Menashe told the court that the marathon treason trial, now in its fifth week, had taken a significant toll on his personal life.
”I am in the middle of a very, very nasty divorce case that has been created partly because of this case,” he said. He claimed his wife had received intimidating calls from members of Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), saying she
and her child would be in danger if her husband testified in Zimbabwe.
The consultant said his wife fled to the United States, taking their child, and he consequently had her arrested on kidnapping charges. In revenge, Ben Menashe said, his wife and mother-in-law filed assault charges against him.
During re-examination by state lawyer Bharat Patel, the court heard that Ben Menashe signed a contract with the opposition that included ”the elimination of policies unfavourable to” the MDC.
Ben Menashe admitted that ”eliminate” and ”kill” are two interchangeable terms in the ”political language in North America” and refer to getting rid of undesirable policies.
Defence counsel have been at pains to show that not once during the four-hour long video did Tsvangirai utter incriminatory words such as ”kill”, ”murder” or ”assassinate”.
While Tsvangirai is heard to use the word ”eliminate” on the tape this could have been in relation to its meaning in the language of the contract, the defence has argued.
The MDC deny wanting to kill Mugabe. They say they were lured by Ben Menashe’s promise to raise at least two million US dollars for their party from the Jewish community in the United States, if the opposition first paid him $500 000.
Tsvangirai is standing trial along with two senior MDC officials. They deny the charges, which carry the death penalty on conviction.
The trial is expected to last at least another two months, with 10 more witnesses due to appear for the state. – Sapa-AFP