Zimbabwe MP arrested for denigrating Mugabe: MDC

Fri Jul 31, 2009 4:00pm GMT

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HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwean police arrested a legislator from Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai's party on Friday for playing a song they said denigrated President Robert Mugabe, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) said.

The MDC, which formed a unity government with Mugabe's ZANU-PF in February, is accusing Mugabe's ZANU-PF of instigating arrests of lawmakers to whittle its slim majority in parliament.

The MDC said Stewart Garadhi, an MP for Chinhoyi constituency about 100 km (62 Miles) west of Harare, had been picked up by plain clothes officers who accused him of playing a popular MDC song extolling Tsvangirai.

He has been detained at a police station in Chinhoyi, the MDC said in a statement. Police and ZANU-PF officials were not immediately available for comment.

The MDC says some senior security officers are targeting its members as part of a plot to derail the new administration.

On Thursday the MDC's deputy minister of youth Tamsanqa Mahlangu appeared in court on charges of stealing a cellphone.

He was granted a $50 bail by a Harare magistrate on Friday but the state invoked a section of the country's tough security laws to keep him in detention for longer.

Five other MDC legislators have appeared in court on charges ranging from political violence to corruption. On Friday a magistrate in the southern town of Masvingo acquitted an MDC lawmaker who was on trial for corruption.

<p>Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe addresses delegates at the ruling ZANU-PF's People's Conference in Bindura, about 90 km (56 miles) north of the capital Harare, December 19, 2008. REUTERS/Philimon Bulawayo</p>

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