HARARE - An aspiring Manicaland councillor in President Robert Mugabe’s Zanu PF is battling for life at Rusape Hospital after surviving a petrol bomb attack in a suspected politically-motivated case, police have confirmed.

National police spokesperson Charity Charamba said police are investigating a case in which William Chapepa is alleged to have been petrol-bombed by unknown people on Monday night and sustained burns on his thighs.

“We have received a case in which Cde William Chapepa, a Zanu PF aspiring candidate in Makoni West, ward 1, was attacked by unknown people,” Charamba told a news conference yesterday.

“According to information given to the police, Chapepa woke up around 2am after hearing explosive sounds only to find a flame of fire besides his car. When he tried to check what it was, he discovered that it was a petrol bomb.”

Charamba said police were probing the attack.

The reported petrol bomb comes barely a month after a schoolboy, Christpower Maisiri whose father Shepherd is an MDC aspiring MP in the nearby constituency died in a fertiliser and chemical inferno, according to police. - Xolisani Ncube