Tsvangirai jailed two years for kidnapping young girls

Beitbridge casanova, Rayson Tsvangirai Rushwaya, who is infamous for seducing numerous schoolgirls, yesterday broke down and cried in court when he was jailed for an effective two years for kidnapping and unlawful detention of young girls.

"Can the court allow me to pay a fine or even compensate the parents I wronged instead of sending me to jail," he sobbed.

The 26-year-old, who had now turned to God and prayed for people at a local church, even offered to marry the girls.

"I am asking the court for forgiveness … I will marry the girls," he pleaded with an unamused resident magistrate Gloria Takundwa, who, for sentencing, took the two counts as one.

Rushwaya was convicted of contravening section 93(1)(b) of the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act, which makes it an offence to detain a child below 17 without the consent of parents.

Takundwa said the State proved its case beyond reasonable doubt and met all the essential elements to prove a case.

Although the girls went to Rushwaya willingly, parents of both girls had not relinquished custody of their children. They actually reported to the police, Takundwa said.

Between October and November last year, Rushwaya stayed with a 17-year-old girl he violently dismissed when she fell pregnant.

On February 23 this year until April 20, another girl fled her home to settle with Rushwaya. The convict was arrested when the mother of the girl reported to the police.

The girl was found at his house.

Rushwaya, who in mitigation said he was a father of one, was this year a subject of discussion by a panel of government departments after 12 girls from a local secondary school confessed to having slept with him.

Takundwa, who advised Rushwaya to appeal after he raised his hands several times with requests, sentenced him to four years in jail, but conditionally suspended the other two for five years.

Lloyd Mupfungidza prosecuted.