Nine women were arrested for allegedly booing First Lady Auxillia Mnangagwa during her address at Watsomba Business Centre in Manicaland province on Wednesday, 10 April 2024.
The women had reportedly failed to get some freebies, which Mnangagwa was handing out as part of her charitable work.
The Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) identified the nine women as Nester Chatiwana aged 41 years, Panashe Machekanzondo aged 19 years, Winnet Sithole aged 19 years, Maria Choto aged 49 years, Esnath Choto aged 33 years, Ellen Rujuwa aged 28 years, Faith Chidhakwa aged 30 years, Patience Matasva aged 35 years and Joyce Mashingaidza aged 29 years.
They were arrested by Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) officers on 10 April at Watsomba Business Centre and detained at Mutare Central Police Station, before being charged with disorderly conduct in a public place as defined in section 41(b) of the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act.
It was the State’s case that the women seated on the ground stood up and started booing the First Lady while she was making her closing remarks during her address intending to disrupt her speech and show disgruntlement that they had not received anything from her.
Prosecutors alleged that the behaviour allegedly exhibited by Chatiwana, Machekanzondo, Sithole, Choto, Choto, Rujuwa, Chidhakwa, Matasva and Mashingaidza, prosecutors said, was unlawful, abusive and insulting to Mnangagwa.
The nine women were released on Friday 12 April 2024 on free bail by Mutare Magistrate Prisca Manhibi following the intervention of ZLHR’s Tatenda Sigauke and David Tandiri.
They will return to court on 30 April 2024.
In their defence, Chatiwana, Machekanzondo, Sithole, Choto, Choto, Rujuwa, Chidhakwa, Matasva and Mashingaidza, who deny the charges, argued that they were just targeted during a dragnet arrest after they opted to leave the venue early and when Mnangagwa was still addressing people and before being dismissed.
The alleged booing of Auxillia Mnangagwa echoes an incident from November 2017 when ZANU PF youths reportedly heckled former First Lady Grace Mugabe at White City Stadium in Bulawayo.
The ZANU PF youths were then prosecuted for insulting and undermining the late former president Robert Mugabe’s wife.
The heckling of Grace Mugabe angered her husband, who fingered President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who at the time served as his Vice President, for instigating the jeering of his wife.
The ZANU PF political party youths, whom ZLHR represented, were later set free after prosecutors withdrew charges of insulting or undermining the former First Lady.
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