JUSTICE IN ZIMBABWE 103 ____________________________________________________________________ Hearings and judgments Without a careful study of the records — which is impossible, since they have not been transcribed — it is difficult to assess the correctness of the judgments given in those election petitions that have been decided. What one can say, however, is that they show a considerable divergence of approach by the different judges who have heard them, particularly as between the judges who were appointed before the election and those who were appointed afterwards. As an example of this, one can contrast the approach of Devittie J in the Mutoko South Election Petition (HH-68-2001) and that of Hlatshwayo J in the Mberengwa West petition (HH-43-2002). In both cases there were allegations of widespread violence and intimidation which affected the results. In both there was evidence that much of the violence centred round the land issue. And in both there were allegations that the successful ZANU (PF) candidates had instigated, or at least connived at, the violence and intimidation. In the first case there was evidence that before her nomination the successful candidate had attended a meeting at which abducted opposition supporters had been paraded, and that she had contributed money to buy food for the abductors. Devittie J held that when she did so she was aware that the abductors had embarked upon a course of conduct whose specific aim or effect was to boost her prospects of success in the pending election; she therefore recognised and accepted their agency and was answerable in law for what they did. Accordingly, he declared that she had not been properly elected. By contrast, in the Mberengwa West Election Petition Hlatshwayo J found that the successful ZANU (PF) candidate was not responsible for proven incidents of intimidation committed by a war veteran who was named as part of his campaign team. 159 The judge subjected the evidence to minute scrutiny and, having decided that the war veteran was a man “genuinely passionate about the resolution of the land issue in the country”, came to the conclusion that the incidents “were linked more to land occupations than to the election campaign itself.” In his view, the land issue was not connected with the election, even though it was one of the main planks in the ruling party’s platform. He justified this separation of the issues with the dubious statement that: