Tendai Biti, the former minister of finance in Zimbabwe, has apologized after being found guilty on Monday of verbally abusing Tatiana Aleshina, a Russian investor. Biti sincerely apologised before Magistrate Vongai Muchuchuti for what had transpired stating that that he never intended to hurt Aleshina.
On Monday, a Harare magistrate ruled that the former Zimbabwean minister, Tendai Biti, was guilty of assaulting a Russian investor and businesswoman. The case is from an incident that occurred in 2020, in which Biti was accused of calling Aleshina, the Russian investor, a stupid moron.
According to Biti, this problem was exaggerated and won’t occur again. The attorney for the former minister, Alec Muchadehama, stated that “the defendant sincerely apologizes for the incident”.
Muchadehama said that although he could have apologised sooner, he refrained from doing so out of concern for the status of an ongoing legal matter. He also noted that “What happened is unlikely to occur again. The accused has no appetite to engage in that conduct again. He knows what will happen if this sorry case happens again.”
According to the ruling of Magistrate Vongai Guwuriro, Biti “pointed a finger at the complainant shouting ‘You, stupid stupid stupid Tatiana.” She went on to underline the prosecution’s witnesses’ reliability by saying, “The witnesses are credible witnesses and the court has no reason to doubt their testimonies.”
Guwuriro admitted that the passage of time since the occurrence may have caused some details—like Biti’s exact words—to be forgotten.
The attorney for the defendant claimed there was no physical assault, that the former finance minister was not a violent person and that the incident would not reoccur.
