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Tendai Rupapa Senior Court Reporter
AN OFFICIAL from the Standards Association of Zimbabwe, who examined petrol bombs that were meant to bomb the First Family’s Alpha Omega Dairy in Mazowe, yesterday said the “Molotov cocktails” could have caused serious damage to the property had they been ignited.

This emerged during the trial of Borman Ngwenya accused of possession of weaponry for sabotage and money laundering.

Frank Chipendo, a quality assurance officer at SAZ, said the Molotov cocktails (bombs), which were in 750ml brandy bottles were made of petrol, ammonium nitrate, nails and sand.

Mr Chipendo told the court that if the accused persons had used the correct ratio of the fertiliser and petrol, the bombs were going to be lethal.

“Your Worship, if they had used the correct ratio of 94 percent of ammonium nitrate and 6 percent of petrol, the impact and effect was going to be more dangerous.

“ . . . but whether they used the correct ratio or not, the fact that there was a mixture of petrol, sand and fertiliser, if ignited, the fertiliser bombs were still going to explode. However, we did not test the extent of the damage,” he said.

He said such bombs were mainly used in the mining industry.

Ngwenya and his alleged accomplices Owen Kuchata, Silas Pfupa and Solomon Makumbe also targeted the Chinese Embassy in Harare and President Mugabe’s rural home in Ku- tama.

The revelations came out of a video filmed while Ngwenya, a soldier, was making indications to police.

The video was played in court.

In the video, Ngwenya is seen leading the police to the Chinese Embassy and revealing how they intended to bomb the offices. They proceeded to President Mugabe’s rural home in Zvimba and stopped by a pigsty.

Ngwenya told the police that they had visited the place before for surveillance.

They wanted to poison the pigs.

Regional magistrate Ms Fadzai Mthombeni deferred the matter to tomorrow when the investigating officer is expected to testify.

They are also facing treason charges.

Mr Michael Reza prosecuted.

Ngwenya was represented by Mr Exactly Mangezi.