“They came looking for me so that they could detain me the whole weekend. Fortunately I am away. These are all trumped up charges,” he said in a telephone interview.Sikhala’s personal assistant, David Hwangwa, said Sikhala, who was last week acquitted of a charge for harbouring an alien, was now being accused of raping that very person he was being accused of having illegally brought into the country.
“The alien, who by now should have been deported back to South Africa five months ago, is now being used by the CIO in circumstances reminiscent of the Ari Ben Menashe sting against Morgan Tsvangirai to achieve political ends,” he said.
Hwangwa alleged that State security agents had been plotting against Sikhala for a long time. “The MDC99 is prepared to enjoy the circus of a desperate regime that is clinging onto the straws of desperate conmen who are feeding on the gullibility of the State security agents that have gone to the dogs,” he said.
Hwangwa said the charges of rape being leveled against Sikhala had no substance considering the fact that the woman, swore in court that even though they shared the same room on one occasion, they did not engage in sex.
He said this shows that the woman was now a State apparatus being used to “topple and take down” Sikhala with the assistance of a named former executive member of MDC99.
Hwangwa questioned why matters of rape were now being handled by the Law and Order Section of the police service. Harare provincial police spokesperson Inspector James Sabau could not be drawn to confirm whether or not the police were looking for him.
“We don’t carry out investigations through the media. However, if he knows that the police are looking for him then he simply has to present himself rather than going to the media,” said Sabau, adding that Sikhala was just seeking relevance.
