The High Court has dismissed former cabinet minister Walter Mzembi’s bid for bail pending trial, ruling that his seven-year absence from court showed a wilful disregard for the law and made him an untrustworthy candidate for release.
Justice Maxwell Dembure, handing down judgment in Harare, said the ex-minister — facing charges of theft of trust property involving over US$1 million in public assets — failed to prove any exceptional circumstances justifying his freedom.
“It is common cause that the appellant was on outstanding warrants of arrest for almost seven years,” Justice Dembure said. “There was nothing to show that he was incapacitated or bedridden for all these years until June 2025. Clearly, the evidence was not convincing.”
Mzembi, who fled the country in 2018 after being granted temporary release of his passport for medical treatment in South Africa, only resurfaced in June 2025. He argued that his cancer treatment explained his absence and that changed circumstances, including the withdrawal of charges against his co-accused, warranted his release on bail.
But the judge was unmoved, stressing that “the existence of new facts does not automatically result in the applicant being granted bail.”
Dembure found that Mzembi’s conduct had caused the prolonged delay in bringing the case to trial: “His long absence from the jurisdiction of the court clearly caused the delay in the finalisation of his case. Having made his bed, he must lie on it.”
The court also rejected arguments based on property title deeds tendered as surety. “Those averments do not plead the issue of title deeds as a ground for bail on changed circumstances,” ruled Dembure.
“If the court was convinced that, despite the long default, he could be trusted with his liberty, it would have accepted them earlier. It did not.”
Concluding, the judge said there was no basis to interfere with the magistrate’s original decision to revoke Mzembi’s bail.
“The appeal is completely without merit. It must fail,” he ruled.
Mzembi will remain in custody pending trial.
