Is this the same mayor who's wife was murdered and beaten to an unreconisable state by the ZANU-PF?

No, that was Emmanuel Chiroto whose wife was killed by the ZANU-PF militia; he was elected . Chiroto stood down from office after SADC negotiations between ZANU-PF and MDC-T/MDC-M, which had supposedly agreed to replace the executive mayor with a non-executive mayor. Chiroto, whom The Herald didn't mention in this article, is now the Deputy Mayor, but Masunda (the former head of the Associated Newspapers of Zimbabwe) was supported by Tsvangirai, so Masunda got the unanimous majority of the 46-member council, which is controlled by MDC-T.

What's weird is that the first executive mayor of Harare was Solomon Tawengwa of the ZANU-PF (1995-1999, got fired by Mugabe). Ever since Elias Mudzuri of the MDC was elected in 2002, the ZANU-PF-dominated national government has always stuck its foot into the politics of the municipal-provincial government of Harare, and now the ZANU-PF wanted to get rid of the position of executive mayor just to deprive the MDC of executive control.

I'm thinking that the ZANU-PF is either anticipating that they'll never gain the majority of the council for the time being and will press for further divestment of political offices of party influence in order to say "if we can't have it, nobody will", or they are hoping that the current violence will cow the opposition into a subordinate, and possibly fragmented position of representation in all levels of government, be it national or local.

I call it "cutting your nose just to spite your face."

I forgot to end the beginning sentence: Chiroto was elected on June 15 by the council, of which 45 of the 46 members are MDC-T. Then his wife was kidnapped and killed, then he went into hiding until his party agreed on electing a non-executive mayor before the end of the month. Masunda was elected on July 2, and Chiroto was elected as Deputy Mayor.