HARARE - Charity, the wife of incarcerated MDC Youth Assembly president Solomon Madzore, has claimed prison authorities on Tuesday barred her from seeing her husband.

Madzore is in jail charged with undermining President Robert Mugabe’s authority after allegedly calling him a “limping donkey”.

Madzore was granted bail by Bindura Magistrate Elisha Singano but remains in custody after State prosecutor Munyaradzi Mataranyika invoked Section 121 of the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Act, claiming he wanted to appeal against the $100 bail order.

The section gives prosecutors powers to notify the court of their intention to challenge a bail order and, in such cases, the suspect remains in custody for seven days pending the hearing of the appeal.

“They (prison authorities) told me there is only one visit in the morning in which three people are allowed. There is no lunch or supper,” Charity told the Daily News.

Contacted for comment Zimbabwe Prisons spokesperson Simon Kaondo declined to shed light on the institution’s policy regarding visitors and requested questions in writing.

Madzore’s wife, who endured over a year without her husband, said she was mortified with the prospect of going for another stretch without her husband.

“We are preparing for anything. He might be in for a long time or they could free him,” she said.

“It is a painful scenario to deal with, but there is little we can do now than wait. It is affecting the children who were now enjoying their father’s company only to see him taken away again.”

Madzore’s elder brother Paul said his brother was being treated unfairly.

“It is nothing but dictatorship at play. It is the kind that we read in George Orwell’s Animal Farm, in which some animals are more equal than others. Solomon should actually be a free man but because he is MDC now he is languishing in prison for a petty offence and that is if he committed it,” the elder Madzore brother said.

MDC youth secretary for information Clifford Hlatywayo said Madzore was being persecuted because Zanu PF was afraid of the power the youth assembly posed ahead of elections. - Staff Writer