BY HARRIET CHIKANDIWA PROSECUTOR Tapiwa Kasema (45), who is facing allegations of criminal abuse of office, will spend another night in custody after Harare Magistrate Ngoni Nduna set his bail ruling for Wednesday. Kasema was arrested for consenting to bail in a case involving four armed serial robbers. He works at the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) as a principal law officer. It is alleged that on August 24, armed robbers Musa Taj Abdul, Tapiwa Rudolf, Godfrey Mupanhanga and accomplices were arrested in Beitbridge over a spate of murders and armed robbery cases committed in and around Zimbabwe. On August 25, they were taken to court facing 53 counts of armed robbery, where they were denied bail and remanded in custody. Sometime this month, Abdul applied for bail and the NPA assigned Kasema together with two other officers to oppose the application. On December 8, Kasema allegedly consented to the granting of bail without following laid down procedures. The court heard that the offence came to light after the CID Homicide queried the release of the accused on bail by the High Court on December 11, 2020, and it came out that Kasema had unlawfully consented to the release of the applicants. A report was then made to the police leading to the arrest of Kasema. He will spend another night in custody after Nduna postponed the hearing to tomorrow.
