HARARE – A Harare Magistrate this week removed a senior official of Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai’s MDC party – charged with stealing weapons from an army barrack – from remand after the state failed to produce evidence linking him to the firearms theft.

MDC transport manager Pascal Gwezere who was abducted from his Mufakose home last October by state security agents for allegedly stealing firearms from Pomona army barracks was last year placed on a US$500 bail and ordered to report to Harare Central Police Station twice a week on Mondays and Fridays. But Harare Magistrate Gloria Takundwa on Tuesday removed Gwezere from remand after ruling that the state had failed to produce evidence linking him to the commission of the offence. The magistrate also said the state had failed to produce a docket in Gwezere’s case.

Gwezere had already been removed from remand on another charge of undergoing military training at Soroti camp in Uganda under an alleged plot to topple President Robert Mugabe’s previous administration from power. The MDC transport manager who became the latest victim of abductions was kidnapped by military intelligence officers, Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) operatives, detectives from Law and Order, Police Internal Security Intelligence (PISI) and 15 police officers from his home. Gwezere, who accuses his abductors of torturing him, sustained serious injuries on his head, wrist, mouth, ear, feet, leg, buttocks, back and genitals during interrogation by the state agents.

The MDC maintains that the charges against Gwenzere and its other activists are baseless and politically motivated. Tsvangirai’s party says “politically motivated prosecution” of its members is a sign of Mugabe’s refusal to abide by the global political agreement (GPA), the power-sharing agreement signed by Zimbabwe’s political leaders in 2008 at the behest of the Southern African Development Community (SADC). The GPA is the foundation of the Harare coalition government.

The Zimbabwean