Zim Finance Minister seeks court protection as he faces probe

Zimbabwe’s Finance Minister Tendai Biti has filed three separate High Court applications to bar police from obtaining his mobile phone records amid allegations that he is being investigated for alleged fraud.

The police serious fraud squad approached the country’s largest mobile phone operator and threatened its managers with arrest if they did not hand over the minister’s phone activity, state media reported on Tuesday.

Mr Biti who is also the secretary general of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) led by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai has argued that the release of the phone records would amount to harassment and an infringement of his fundamental rights.

He said he had not committed any offence that would warrant the release of the information.

“I fear that should the respondent (Econet) be bullied into submission, my constitutional right to privacy would be unjustifiably interfered with and in addition, vital information pertaining to the organisations I am heading will be unlawfully accessed,” Mr Biti said in one his court applications.

“I am a government minister and a legal practitioner of this honourable court and I have committed no criminal offence.

“I have not been investigated of any offence and the basis upon which the warrant may well have been obtained was clearly false.”

Four Ministry of Finance officials were last week arrested but were released on bail on Monday.

The officials are allegedly accused of going on unsanctioned foreign trips and flouting tender procedures.

According to a government paper, the Sunday Mail, one of them Ms Petronella Chishawa was accused of having an extra marital affair with Mr Biti.

The minister denied the allegations and has threatened to sue the newspaper. Zimbabwean police have been accused of persecuting President Robert Mugabe’s opponents.

At the weekend, three government ministers from the smaller from the smaller MDC faction were briefly detained for allegedly holding an unsanctioned meeting.

Mr Biti has been arrested several times in the past. In 2008 he was charged with treason but he was acquitted.

Amid the tension, Zimbabwe’s two main political parties have agreed to a timeline for reforms that will pave the way for fresh elections, but no date for the polls was set.

“We signed the election roadmap,” said Energy Minister Elton Mangoma, one of Mr Tsvangirai’s representatives in the negotiations.

“We agreed on what needs to be done before elections can take place,” he told AFP.

The state-run Herald newspaper said the negotiators agreed that amendments to electoral laws should be completed within 45 days from the July 6 signing of the roadmap.

Voter education should take place within the following 30 days, and preparation of a new voter’ roll within two months, it said.

Negotiators from Mr Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change and long-ruling President Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF made no decision on a timeline for a new constitution.

Under Zimbabwe’s unity accord, signed after 2008 presidential elections violently failed, calls for a new constitution to be approved by referendum before new general elections.

Negotiators agreed to let a parliamentary committee decide the timeline for the constitutional process, which is running a year behind schedule, the Herald said.