Sikhala hints on suing state after High Court acquittal
Jail robbed politician of freedom, job as MP and potential earnings as lawyer
By Staff Reporter
Opposition politician and ex-legislator, Job Sikhala has hinted on possible plans to sue after he was on Monday acquitted, on appeal at the High Court, of crimes that kept him under pre-trial detention for nearly two years.
Sikhala, who was Citizens Coalition for Change MP for Zengeza West, was jailed June 2022 on alleged violence incitement and publishing falsehoods.
He went through his entire trial while coming from Chikurubi Maximum Prison, some of the times with his hands and legs cuffed.
Together with co-accused legislator Godfrey Sithole, who endured less jail time upon arrest, they were handed wholly suspended two-year prison sentence by Harare magistrate Tafadzwa Miti in January this year.
Their conviction and sentence have since been quashed by High Court judges of appeal Pisirayi Kwenda and Benjamin Chikoore after he filed an appeal through his lawyers.
Is long detention for nearly 600 days cost the firebrand activist some potential earnings from his job as a lawyer and position as sitting MP at the time.
In comments following his acquittal, Sikhala insisted his jailing was motivated by political persecution by the Zanu PF led government.
“I feel that I have been abused for almost two years in prison,” he said.
“Like what I have always said, that was political persecution, everything that has happened for me to remain in prison for almost two years was political persecution, they wanted to obtain their own political goals over my arbitrary detention at Chikurubi Maximum prison for 595 days.
“I always told the nation and the world that there is not anything that I committed … everything that the state was marketing to the public was false.”
Feared by the ruling authority for his aggressive activism and organisational capabilities, Sikhala hinted on plans to sue.
“It was only an intention for them to get to me politically and to tell the truth I’m disappointed and I hope my lawyers will go down and sit and consider the suffering that I went through for 595 days when I did not commit any crime,” he said.
