High Court today reserved its judgment of Opposition party, Movement for Democratic Change (MDC)’s National Executive member, Paddington Japajapa’s appeal of his two year jail sentence for unconstitutionally announcing election results to August 30
The High Court of Zimbabwe reserved the judgement for his application in which he is saying the sentence passed by the magistrates court was not fair for the offense being levelled against him.
The MDC national Executive member was convicted for the charge of ‘unofficial or false declaration of results’ by a Harare Magistrate Learnmore Mapiye, who decided that Japa Japa will be locked up for three years, suspending one year on condition of good behaviour, considering that Japajapa had no prior offence related to the case.
The State’s case was that on July 31, 2018, the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) was announcing election results when Japajapa held a press conference and threatened to call for chaos, claiming the elections had been rigged
Meanwhile, MDC vice president Tendai Biti was convicted of the same offence, prior to the same election period but however, he was sentenced to a wholly suspended six-month imprisonment sentence on condition of good behaviour.
The MDC vice-chairperson was also ordered to pay $200 fine or seven days imprisonment.
However, the MDC is still adamant that the ZEC connived with the ruling ZANU PF to manipulate the election results in favour of ZANU PF presidential candidate, Emmerson Mnangagwa.
Mnangagwa was declared the winner in the election that was unsuccessfully challenged by the opposition MDC at the courts.
