ZANU PF ‘criminal’ candidate manages to file nomination papers

By Tichaona Sibanda

The MDC-T will this week approach the electoral court seeking to have the ZANU PF parliamentary candidate for Mazowe North disqualified, on the basis that he has criminal record. 

Edgar Chidavaenzi, successfully filed his papers with the nomination court in Bindura last week Friday but failed to disclose the custodial sentence. The aspiring ZANU PF candidate was earlier this year sentenced to three years in jail for stealing a grain silo.

He took down a massive grain silo from Forrester estate in Mvurwi and took it away. However the sentence was wholly suspended on condition that he returns the silo and pays a fine.

The law governing the electoral act in the country stipulates that a candidate is automatically disqualified from seeking office if they’re convicted and sentenced to jail for a period that stretches more than six months.

Shepherd Mushonga, the MDC-T parliamentary candidate for Mazowe central and a lawyer by profession, told SW Radio Africa that they will actively pursue Chidavaenzi’s case with the electoral court.

‘It so happened that on the day he was convicted I was present in a regional court that sat in Bindura early this year. So when he successfully filed his papers I produced copies of his indictment to the presiding officer.

‘While the law is silent on issues of suspended convictions, Chidavaenzi was dishonest by conveniently failing to disclose his conviction on his nomination papers. This is coming from a man who is seeking public office and yet the rules are clear,’ said Mushonga.

Meanwhile Joshua Sacco, a white farmer well known for promoting political violence against the MDC-T in Manicaland province, is to stand as a ZANU PF parliamentary candidate for Chimanimani East in the forthcoming elections.

Sacco, who was elected the deputy secretary for production in the ZANU PF youth league four years ago, beat the incumbent MP Samuel Undenge, the ZANU PF deputy Minister of Economic Planning and Investment Promotion.

In 2009 Sacco travelled to Johannesburg, South Africa as part of a ZANU PF propaganda team led by Jonathan Moyo that made headlines at a SADC summit by staging protests, denouncing the MDC-T.

The MDC-T once lodged a police report over an incident involving Sacco, who defaced the party’s logos and slogans at its offices at a village in Chimanimani. Sacco was once described by Robert Mugabe as being the last white man standing in ZANU PF. SW Radio Africa