DETAILS: Chamisa barred from meeting Sikhala

Image: ZimReview

Main opposition party Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) leader Nelson Chamisa has been denied access to meet party activists
detained at Chikurubi Maximum Prison.

He had gone to visit incarcerated Members of Parliament Job Sikhala, Godfrey Sithole and fourteen other Nyatsime party activists, but could not be allowed to see them.

Chamisa who had on several occasions been barred from visiting the detained activists was made to wait for three hours at Chikurubi Maximum Prison main gate before being allowed to meet the Officer in Charge.

Speaking to the press after meeting the Officer in Charge, Chamisa said it is unacceptable that he couldn’t be allowed to see the jailed members of his party.

He described the move to bar him from meeting members of his party, as an abuse of the law.

“It’s very sad and regrettable that we had come to see, visit our colleagues honourable members of Parliament honourable Job Sikhala and honourable Sithole but it’s so disheartening to note that just after we had been made to wait for about three hours we were then told that you can now enter to be able to see our colleagues, Upon entering we were then invited at the office to the officer in charge.

“The Officer in Charge of the prisons Mukurume indicated that it’s unfortunate that we are not able to see honourable Job Sikhala and the other Nyatsime colleagues, our citizen heroes because the Minister of Justice has instructed that we can’t see them.

“We are surprised because they stood us for up to two three hours but all of a sudden they tell us we have received an instruction and a phone call that you can’t see all your colleagues, so we are not able to see them.

“It is an embarrassment, it harassment, it is unacceptable that you have this kind of abuse of the law.

“Apart from just being an ordinary citizen I am also a practicing lawyer and I have every right to see any client if need be. They throw away all those considerations to just make it a humiliating act as it has happened very unfortunate we will fight this and we obviously continue to wish our colleagues well, they deserve our solidarity, they deserve our warmth and we continue to provide that in different ways and mechanisms,” Chamisa said.

Recently, prison authorities announced that Chamisa is now able to visit incarcerated party members, after having been denied access on several occasions.

This saw his lawyers petitioning the prison authorities threatening legal action.

Sikhala, Sithole and fourteen others were arrested following violence that erupted at the funeral of slain CCC activist Moreblessing Ali, they are facing charges of inciting public violence and on several times been denied bail by the courts.

Meanwhile, critics say the opposition members and activists are being persecuted for political reasons.