Is Linda Masarira right on violent MDC militia?

Linda Masarira the spokesperson of the MDC-T led by Dr. Thokozani Khuphe has come under fire after being quoted on state media that MDC member were trained in acts of sabotage by a group of Serbians.

Said Masarira, "Could this be the work of some unruly elements who went for training by the Serbians in neighbouring southern African countries during the election period."

This drew a lot of ire from the MDC members who accused Linda of seeking to criminalise the MDC members during the Commission of Inquiry into the 1 August killings.
To ascertain the truthfulness of Linda's statements we dug into the archives and got a report from a book by Dr. Blessing-Miles Tendi entitled: Making History in Mugabe's Zimbabwe.

The book quotes Professor Welshman Ncube who allegedly confessed that MDC used a violent crack team of MDC youths to dismantle the ZANU PF regime.
 
"What then happened from around the time of the treason trial, but more so December 2004, the president's office sent Ghandi Mudzingwa, Dennis Murira and two others to Serbia to do training on mass action," Welshman is quoted saying. "They then tell us later that one of the things they were taught in Serbia was that in order to engage in successful mass action, you needed a core group of young people who had no stake in society, who had nothing to lose. They went ahead and recruited these people when they came back  from Mbare, Highfields  pickpockets, thieves and all and trained them and they were supposed to be our core group and all this behind our back. We did not know about it until we were doing an investigation after the (intra-party violence) in May 2005, they then confessed to doing all this."

Ncube continued:"And when these youths were not effectively used in mass action, they then became a readily available army – anyone who wanted youths to hire against an opponent they were then available. Those who had recruited them started telling them mass action failed because Priscilla was opposed to it, you must deal with her, oh there is a group of people who want to remove Morgan Tsvangirai from the presidency of the MDC, the chairman of Mashonaland East, go and abduct him and bring him to Harvest House, strip him, use broom sticks, sjamboks to beat him. Order him to address a crowd like this of men and women completely stripped and when he does not do what you want, you assault him again – broken arms, broken legs, broken fingures (sic)."

The MDC  was once accused of having a violent team of youths called the Democratic Resistance Committee which was later succeeded by the Vanguard.

MDC says it had since disbanded the Vanguard after the skirmishes that happened at the burial of Morgan Tsvangirai in Buhera earlier this year.