A witness in the trial of a white Zimbabwean security expert, Michael Hitschmann, has claimed the man planned to kill four prominent businessmen as a bad-taste birthday present for President Robert Mugabe, it was reported on Friday.
Army instructor Israel Phiri told a packed court in Mutare this week that Hitschmann tried to recruit him into the little-known Zimbabwe Freedom Movement, a United Kingdom-based splinter group that says it is trying to unseat Mugabe, reports the state-controlled Manica Post.
”He reported to me that they already had a list of names of people who were supposed to be eliminated before President Mugabe’s birthday celebrations in Mutare in February,” Phiri told the court.
The four were ruling-party businessmen and officials based in the eastern border city of Mutare and the second city of Bulawayo, Phiri was quoted as saying.
The army officer claimed Hitschmann and his colleagues also planned to burn the offices of the state-run Chronicle newspaper in Bulawayo and spill oil on a major Mutare highway so that Mugabe’s vehicle would slip and overturn.
Hitschmann has been in custody since March, when police announced they had found a weapons cache at his Mutare home.
The police said he was linked to the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and wanted to overthrow Mugabe with the help of disaffected army officers.
He has been charged under Zimbabwe’s tough Public Order and Security Act for possessing weapons for insurgency, banditry, sabotage and terrorism. If convicted, he could face life imprisonment.
Hitschmann denies the charges. His lawyers say their client is a registered arms dealer and was thus entitled to have weapons on his property.
Phiri says Hitschmann promised him $500 a month, to be paid into a bank account in neighbouring Mozambique, if he agreed to work for the Zimbabwe Freedom Movement, reports the Manica Post.
The army officer says he briefed his army superiors in Harare on the matter, while pretending to work with Hitschmann. The trial continues. — Sapa-dpa