JUSTICE IN ZIMBABWE 127 ____________________________________________________________________ “A High Court upheld a legal challenge to the results of the June 2000 parliamentary race in the Buhera North constituency in Mashonaland East Province, in which MDC President Morgan Tsvangirai campaigned and lost against ZANU-PF's Kenneth Manyonda. The basis of the challenge filed on 26 July 2000 was that political killings, assaults and other intimidation prevented voters there from freely exercising their right to vote for whom they wished. Some 10 months later, in April 2001, Judge James Devittie gave his final ruling that the election result was nullified, in part because of the terror caused by the 15 April 2000 killings of Tichaona Chiminya and Talent Mabika. During the hearings, a witness testified in the High Court on 23 February 2001 that he was with the two individuals alleged to be the killers - CIO agent Joseph Mwale and war veteran Kainos Tom “Kitsiyatota” Zimunya, as well as a group of ZANU-PF youths. The witness said they drove a ZANU-PF Manicaland Nissan twin-cab truck to the CIO office at Murambinda, near Buhera on 15 April 2000; both Joseph Mwale and Kainos Tom Zimunya entered the office and each had an AK rifle when they left the office. With the witness in the vehicle, they drove with other men along the road from Murambinda to Buhera and overtook a red Mazda truck in which MDC supporters were travelling in the same direction. Speeding past the MDC Mazda truck, the ZANU-PF Manicaland Nissan then parked by a bus stop, blocking the road. Joseph Mwale and Kainos Tom Zimunya pointed their AK rifles at the MDC vehicle in which Tichaona Chiminya and Talent Mabika drove, forcing them to stop. According to the witness Joseph Mwale and Kainos Tom Zimunya began assaulting Tichaona Chiminya and Talent Mabika as they sat inside their truck. The other MDC supporters in the Mazda fled, while Joseph Mwale and Kainos Tom Zimunya took a container of liquid from the ZANU-PF truck, sprinkled it inside the MDC vehicle and set it alight. Joseph Mwale and Kainos Tom Zimunya then sped off from the scene of the killing. [Daily News, “Chiminya killers named in court”, 24 February 2001.] On 28 February, another witness said he was in the vehicle with Tichaona Chiminya and Talent Mabika when Joseph Mwale, Kainos Tom Zimunya and other ZANU-PF supporters attacked the vehicle. The witness was quoted in the press as testifying: ‘I then saw two armed men. One of them, Mwale, approached our vehicle and started beating Chiminya with the butt of his gun. Talent was screaming as the attackers broke the windscreen.’ The witness said he managed to escape from the vehicle through one of the windows. ‘I then heard them saying that they should fetch the petrol from their car...They poured the liquid in the front seat where Chiminya and Mabika were sitting. Thereafter, the car went up in flames.’ The witness saw Tichaona Chiminya manage to get out of the

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