Nelson Chamisa Hires Mandela’s Lawyer To Fight Election Result

The Zimbabwean opposition led by Nelson Chamisa have hired a top South African advocate to fight the Constitutional Court challenge being heard this week.

Jeremy Gauntlett, who was the lawyer for South Africa’s first black president, Nelson Mandela is joining Chamisa’s team along with Thabani Mpofu to fight the election result.

In a similar turn of events to Zambia in 2016, the Con-Court challenge came after the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission declared that President Mnangagwa won by just 6.5%.

The addition of Gauntlett significantly reinforces the team.

Gauntlett, co-author of Bar, Bench & Bullshifters: Cape Tales 1950-1990, was Mandela’s legal advisor, and worked for luminaries suchas Desmond Tutu and Chief Albert Luthuli, as well as the Biko family.

He also helped pen South Africa’s first democratic constitution.

Gautlett also helped South Africa’s former president Jacob Zuma get off the hook and stitched a deal to have him repay state money spent on non-security upgrades to his private residence in Nkandla, after ascandal over lavish improvements including a swimming pool and amphitheatre.

They are expected to argue that the 30 July poll was rigged in a number of ways and that that it wasn’t free and fair because, among others factors, the state media was biased.

They claim to have figures showing that Chamisa was the winner of the poll, and should be declared as such, or alternatively they want a run-off election between the two candidates.