HARARE: Former Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe on Wednesday failed to turn up for a parliamentary hearing where he was due to give evidence on corruption in the diamond mining industry.
The 94-year-old, who is in frail health, had been summoned to a session at 9:00am, but when he did not show up, lawmakers rescheduled the session for Monday.
Committee head Temba Mliswa, an independent lawmaker, told reporters that the parliamentary committee was “cognizant of the fact that 9:00 am was a bit too early” for the former president to show up.
He said the Monday session had been set for 2:00 pm, although no-one in Mugabe’s office would say whether or not he would attend.
Lawmakers want to question him over his 2016 claim that Zimbabwe lost $15 billion in revenue due to corruption and foreign exploitation in the diamond sector.
“We are not here to humiliate him, we expect him to have enough time to prepare. So on Monday at 2:00 p.m. we expect him here,” Mliswa said, although he admitted that Mugabe was not legally obliged to attend.
Mugabe ruled Zimbabwe from 1980 until he was ousted from office in November following a brief military takeover. He denounced his ouster as a coup and has not been seen in public since.
His authoritarian regime has been accused of syphoning off diamond profits.
He was replaced by his former deputy Emmerson Mnangagwa, a veteran loyalist in the ruling ZANU-PF party who was backed by senior military officers.
Zimbabwe discovered alluvial diamonds in Chiadzwa, in the east of the country, more than 10 years ago.
Rights groups have accused security forces of using brutal methods to control the scattered deposits.
The parliamentary committee has already interviewed former ministers, police and intelligence chiefs about the mining industry in Chiadzwa.
Zimbabwe has allowed several diamond companies to mine the area — most of them as joint ventures between the government and Chinese firms. But there have been widespread allegations of mass looting.
In July, Zimbabwe is to hold elections, the first since Mugabe was unseated, with ZANU-PF widely predicted to retain power.
Mnangagwa has vowed to hold a fair and free vote and has pledged to revive the moribund economy by repairing international ties and attracting foreign investment.
Mugabe a no-show at Zimbabwe parliament hearing
Mugabe a no-show at Zimbabwe parliament hearing
Ex-CNN journalist Don Lemon pleads not guilty to Minnesota protest charges
- A magistrate judge ordered Lemon released to await trial, after a night in custody following his arrest late on Thursday by the FBI
LOS ANGELES: Former CNN news anchor Don Lemon entered a not guilty plea on Friday to federal charges over his role covering a protest at a Minnesota church against President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, the Republican administration’s latest move against a critic.
Lemon, now an independent journalist, livestreamed a protest against Trump’s deployment of thousands of armed immigration agents into Democratic-governed Minnesota’s biggest cities. The protest disrupted a January 18 service at Cities Church in St. Paul.
A magistrate judge ordered Lemon released to await trial, after a night in custody following his arrest late on Thursday by the FBI.
Dressed in a cream-colored double-breasted suit, Lemon spoke only to say “yes, your honor” when asked if he understood the proceedings. One of his attorneys said that he pleaded not guilty.
“He is committed to fighting this. He’s not going anywhere,” said Lemon attorney Marilyn Bednarski.
“I have spent my entire career covering the news. I will not stop now,” Lemon told reporters after the hearing. “I will not be silenced. I look forward to my day in court.”
A grand jury indictment charged Lemon, who is Black, with conspiring to deprive others of their civil rights and violating a law that has been used to crack down on demonstrations at abortion clinics but also forbids obstructing access to houses of worship. Six other people who were at the protest, including another journalist, are facing the same charges.
Thousands of protesters took to the streets of Minneapolis and other US cities on Friday to denounce an immigration crackdown in which federal agents fatally shot two US citizens, sparking one of the most serious political crises Trump has faced.
PRESS ADVOCATES ALARMED
Free press advocates voiced alarm over the arrests. Actor and activist Jane Fonda went to show support for Lemon, telling journalists the president was violating the Constitution. “They arrested the wrong Don,” Fonda said.
Trump, who has castigated the protesters in Minnesota, blamed the Cities Church protest on “agitators and insurrectionists” who he said wanted to intimidate Christian worshippers.
Organizers told Lemon they focused on the church because they believed a pastor there was also a senior US Immigration and Customs Enforcement employee.
More than a week ago, the government arrested three people it said organized the protests. But the magistrate judge in St. Paul who approved those arrests ruled that, without a grand jury indictment, there was not probable cause to issue arrest warrants for Lemon and several others the Justice Department also wanted to prosecute.
“This unprecedented attack on the First Amendment and transparent attempt to distract attention from the many crises facing this administration will not stand,” Abbe Lowell, Lemon’s lawyer, said in a statement, invoking constitutional free speech protections.
In the livestream archived on his YouTube channel, Lemon can be seen meeting with and interviewing the activists before they go to the church, and later chronicling the disruption inside, interviewing congregants, protesters and a pastor, who asks Lemon and the protesters to leave.
Independent local journalist Georgia Fort and two others who had been at the church were also arrested and charged with the same crimes.
US Magistrate Judge Dulce Foster on Friday ordered Fort’s release, denying prosecutors’ request to hold her in custody, according to court documents.
TRUMP CRITICS TARGETED
The Justice Department over the past year has tried to prosecute a succession of Trump’s critics and perceived enemies. Its charges against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, who both led investigations into Trump, were thrown out by a judge.
Lemon spent 17 years at CNN, becoming one of its most recognizable personalities, and frequently criticizes Trump in his YouTube broadcasts. Lemon was fired by CNN in 2023 after making sexist on-air comments for which he later apologized.
Trump frequently lambastes journalists and news outlets, going further than his predecessors by sometimes suing them for damages or stripping them of access-granting credentials.
FBI agents with a search warrant seized laptops and other devices this month from the home of a Washington Post reporter who has covered Trump’s firing of federal workers, saying it was investigating leaks of government secrets.
Press advocates called the FBI search involving the Post reporter and the arrests of Lemon and Fort an escalation of attacks on press freedom.
“Reporting on protests isn’t a crime,” said Jameel Jaffer, executive director of Columbia University’s Knight First Amendment Institute. Jaffer called the arrests alarming, and said Trump sought “to tighten the vise around press freedom.”
Trump has said his attacks are because he is tired of “fake news” and hostile coverage.
Legal experts said they were unaware of any US precedent for journalists being arrested after the fact, or under the two laws used to charge Lemon and Fort. They include the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, a 1994 measure that prevents obstructing access to abortion clinics and places of worship.
