A state witness in the treason trial of Zimbabwe opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai claimed on Thursday that President Robert Mugabe’s death by natural causes was an ”appropriate demise” for the head of state discussed at a key meeting.
This was the testimony given by the second state witness, Tara Thomas in the ongoing treason trial of opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, and two senior party officials accused of plotting to kill Mugabe.
Thomas, an assistant at Dickens and Madson, the Canada-based consultancy firm which implicated the opposition trio in the alleged plot, said a natural death had been suggested by one Edward Simms at a meeting in Montreal, in December 2001, where Tsvangirai allegedly requested Mugabe’s elimination.
”Natural cause will be the appropriate demise for our friend,” Thomas claims Simms told Tsvangirai at that meeting. She was giving her version of what was said on a barely audible video tape that had been secretly made of the four hour-long meeting. The tape is seen as crucial evidence in the state’s case.
The opposition trio deny the treason charges and claim they were set up by Dickens and Madson, which has been linked to Mugabe’s ruling party, to sideline the opposition ahead of 2001 presidential elections.
They face the death penalty if convicted. Thomas, who earlier this week alleged that Tsvangirai wanted Mugabe’s assassination to look like an accident, said on Thursday the opposition leader also wanted Dickens and Madson to arrange discussions between his party and the army, ”He wanted us to arrange some kind of communication between the army and the MDC,” she said.
The court heard that Tsvangirai wanted the vice president to form a transitional government with the MDC. On an audible portion of the tape played on Thursday, Tsvangirai is heard to say a transitional phase should be the foundation for ”a clean election”, and that the military should not step in to fill the breach, but remain impartial guarantors of peace and stability.
”In my view, that would be the most stable way to proceed and, in my view, it will not raise suspicions,” Tsvangirai was heard to say in the recording.
Thomas also alleged that Mugabe’s elimination was to take place within 10 days of the December 4 meeting in Montreal. The treason trial, which is now in its fifth week, has already heard the testimony of Ari Ben Menashe, the head of Dickens and
Madson. Another nine state witnesses are due to testify. – Sapa-AFP