ZIMBABWE – Dr Tapiwa Mudyahoto, a senior lecturer with the Great Zimbabwe University (GZU) has filed a $3m defamation lawsuit against a female student who accused him of demanding sex from her for marks.
The papers were served on Nomsa Mwashita this week under case number 234/2020 and Mirror investigations have shown that the plaintiff plans to defend herself against the claim.
According to papers obtained by The Mirror, Mudyahoto says Mwashita, a Bachelor of Education (BED) student made a false report to authorities alleging that the former demanded sex from her in exchange for marks. Mwashita went on to fail the subject taught by Mudyahoto and she blamed the result on her refusal to give in to her lecturer’s demands.
Mudyahoto who says he has a PHD in Philosophy from Fort Hare University taught Introduction to sport module and in 2019 Mwashita was one of his 24 students under Part one Semester 2.
Mwashita also accused Mudyahoto of showing her his manhood when she visited his office.
Mudyahoto says in his court application that this was defamatory and added that the University has since cleared him of any wrongdoing after three independent lecturers to remarked Mwashita’s examination papers and all three still gave her a fail.
Mudyahoto also alleges that Mwashita failed to provide information on the incident where she was shown the former’s sex organ. This, he says, forced the University to abandon investigations of the matter.
Sources however, told The Mirror that it was not true that Mwashita failed the exam after her papers were remarked. They said that instead all three markers gave her pass marks.
The sources also said that Introduction to Sports is the only module that Mwashita has ever failed during her course work.
“After the publication of results the defendant lodged a false and baseless allegation that she failed the module because she turned down plaintiff’s love proposal.
“The defendant’s allegations were communicated to various departments including student affairs, Human resources, security and the vice chancellor’s office,” reads part of the court document.
