London: A teacher who encouraged the overthrow of Zimbabwe's government was jailed for four years on Friday under UK counter-terrorism laws.

William Chinyanga, 52, live-streamed a series of speeches on his Facebook page in protest at the ZANU-PF government in early December 2019.

He urged his audience to bomb petrol stations and fuel tankers, blow up bridges, torch police vehicles and attack security forces.

The videos were reported to UK counter-terrorism police, who arrested Chinyanga at his home in north London in February 2020.

The political activist, who was born in Zimbabwe and was granted leave to remain in the UK after seeking asylum, was charged in January 2021.

He was found guilty by a jury at a trial in November of two counts of encouraging terrorist acts. He was acquitted of two other charges.

Sentencing him at Kingston Crown Court in southwest London, judge Ian Dove told Chinyanga there was no evidence anyone had acted on his words back home.

But he said he had been "at least reckless as to whether others would be encouraged or induced into acts of terrorism.

"You were directing people to violently attack the authorities in Zimbabwe and to use arson to destroy government property and infrastructure," he added.

Chinyanga's objective, the judge said, was to forcibly overthrow the government and "create a war" in the southern African nation.

The head of the Metropolitan Police's Counter Terrorism Command praised the person who reported Chinyanga.

Commander Richard Smith added: "Dangerous rhetoric of this nature can and does have harmful real-world consequences."

Chinyanga is married with children.