HON. GONESE: Thank you very much Hon. Speaker for your indulgence. I also wanted to clarify as we move forward because I believe that the statement made by Hon. Biti and your response – I want to begin by thanking you Hon. Speaker – [HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear.] – I want to confirm that I called you and you gave me very important information which enabled me to communicate with the officer concerned and also to pass the information to the legal practitioner whom we had assigned to represent Hon. Mamombe.
However, I also want to add on some issues which I think will assist us as we move forward to avoid such situations in the future. In casu, as I indicated to you on the phone, Hon. Mamombe …..
THE HON. SPEAKER: Incasu, not everybody here is a lawyer. Be simple.
HON. GONESE: I will say in this case Mr. Speaker.
THE HON. SPEAKER: Yes. Proceed
HON. GONESE: For the benefit of all the other members, in this case, Hon. Mamombe, through her legal practitioner, Mr. Jeremiah Bamu, had communicated with law and order prior to her going to Nyanga as a result of which arrangements had been made for Hon. Mamombe to attend at Harare Central Police Station law and order on Sunday the 3rd of March and this was a matter of concern to us because you had a situation where the Officer-in-Charge had already received communication that Hon. Mamombe, in response to the information that the police wanted to interview her, had already indicated that she was going to attend in the presence of a legal practitioner.
What concerned us was that when she was then picked up in Nyanga, the Officer-in-charge denied that they dispatched a team of officers from Harare Central law and order to go to Nyanga. They denied that the officer in question was out of law, which is a matter of concern for us. When we have got such a situation, in terms of the dignity to be afforded to Hon. Members of Parliament and where such arrangements have been made, surely one would have expected that in that situation, they would have waited for the Hon. Member to surrender herself as arranged and only if the Hon. Member had not turned up on Sunday, 3rd March, could they have made other arrangements? That is one of those aspects where we would expect that officers, law enforcement agencies, will actually afford that dignity to Members of Parliament and allow them or give them an opportunity to cooperate with the police, as had been done in that case which unfortunately was then overtaken by the events whereby Hon. Mamombe was then picked up in Nyanga. That is all I wanted to add, Mr. Speaker.
Continued next page
(1254 VIEWS)
