Vice President Constantino Chiwenga’s ailing estranged wife, Marry Mubaiwa Chiwenga, collapsed and banged her head against the concrete steps as she was leaving court on Wednesday.

Marry was at the Harare Magistrate’s Court, where she is being tried for fraud and misrepresentation over claims she secretly planned to upgrade her marriage. The charges allege that she illegally solemnized a secret marriage presided over by Acting Chief Magistrate Munamato Mutevedzi without Chiwenga’s consent.

Vice President Constantino Chiwenga was supposed to testify against his wife at the trial. However, the former commander of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces failed to testify after the prosecutors applied for the public to be barred from attending Vice President Constantino Chiwenga’s testimony.

The state argued that Chiwenga’s testimony should be closed to the public because of the importance of his office as well as “to protect the private lives of persons concerned in the proceedings”.
Presiding Magistrate Lanzini Ncube postponed his ruling to the state’s application to Thursday.

Marry Chiwenga has been battling to be granted access to her children. The 39-year-old recently poured her heart out on social media, where she revealed that she has not seen her three minor children, who are all below the age of 10, in two years.

She appealed to “all the women in this universe” to help her fight for access to her children and accused the First Lady and the Minister of Women Affairs, Community, Small and Medium Enterprises of failing to speak out on her behalf. She also appealed to the United Nations and its agencies, the United Nations Children’s Fund and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to intervene in her case.