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Tendai Biti, 53, was released on a $ 10,000 bond after a night behind bars, after being charged with assault.
FILE: Former Zimbabwean Finance Minister Tendai Biti at the ANC Elective Conference Gathering on November 23, 2017. Image: Thomas Holder / EWN.
HARARE – Zimbabwean police briefly detained a former finance minister and senior opposition official Friday night on charges of assaulting a Russian national last month, his party spokeswoman said on Saturday.
Tendai Biti, 53, was released on $ 10,000 bond after a night behind bars, after being charged with assault.
The provincial chief magistrate in Harare, Vongai Muchuchuti, set his case for January 18 to stand trial.
The charge against Biti, a lawmaker who is vice chairman of Zimbabwe’s main opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change Alliance (MDC), stems from an alleged incident after a court hearing on November 30.
Biti, who is a qualified attorney, was involved in litigation, representing a client in the Harare airport highway scandal, Tatiana Aleshina, a Russian national who was said to constantly whisper information to the prosecution.
Biti made a complaint to the magistrate about Aleshina’s conduct.
“After the court hearing, Aleshina confronted the Honorable Biti by threatening him not to mention her name,” MDC spokeswoman Fadzai Mahere told AFP, adding that she later filed a police report.
He was arrested and detained when he went to the police to clear his name, Mahere added.
“Biti’s only crime is unearthing the corruption scandal related to the Harare Airport Road land deal involving the plaintiff, Aleshina and businessmen linked to (President) Emmerson Mnangagwa.”
In court, prosecutor Idah Maromo argued that Biti had assaulted Tatiana Aleshina by threatening her, pointing her finger at her face, and shouting insults at the top of her lungs, “with the intention of inspiring fear to believe in her mind.”
Biti denies the charge and his party described it as “fabricated” and an “weapon of law” to attack party members and officials.
His lawyer Alec Muchadehama also argued that the Zimbabwe police “do not work on their own.
“There is an outside force telling them what to do and who to arrest,” he said.
Biti has previously been charged with treason, among other criminal offenses.
Zimbabwean police have arrested several opposition officials in the past, which the party says is a way of weakening their fight against the ruling ZANU PF.
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