JAILED businessman Munyaradzi Kereke has sued the government after it gazetted a farm that he recently bought for his family while in prison.
Kereke is serving a 10-year jail term at Chikurubi Maximum
Security Prison after being convicted of raping his wife’s 11-year-old niece at
gunpoint.
In the application filed at the High Court, Kereke and his
company M.P Kruger (Pvt) Ltd cited Lands minister Anxious Masuka and 71 illegal
occupants that are refusing to vacate the premises since he assumed ownership
in August.
He realised in the government gazette of October 12 that
Masuka had listed Subdivision A of Cranham Extension of Burley Bottom Farm for
compulsory acquisition prompting him to contest the development in the High
Court.
Kereke wants an order declaring as invalid and consequently
reviewing and setting aside the government’s decision to compulsorily acquire
Subdivision A of Cranham Extension of Burley Bottom on October 12 2020.
“The decision was arbitrarily made in violation of the
applicant’s right to be heard and his right to be subjected to fair and just
administrative action.
He was not accorded any notice of the decision to be taken
and was not accorded the right to make representations,” Kereke said.
“The decision is unreasonable. To acquire land from a black
Zimbabwean man with over 20 minor children and two wives, in order to
distribute the same to another black man turns the whole basis of compulsory
land acquisition under section 72 of the Constitution on its head.”
Kereke’s urgent chamber application seeking spoliation
against the 71 illegal occupants from his farm was removed from the urgent
matters’ roll by High Court judge Justice David Foroma.
The 71 occupants had challenged the urgency of the
application on the basis that Kereke and his family had not been in prior
possession of the said property but had gained occupation in August this year.
“The person seeking a spoliation order need only prove that
he was in peaceful and undisturbed possession of the ‘thing’ and that he was
illicitly ousted from such possession,” ruled Foroma.
“The matter has therefore not been shown to be urgent in
the context of spoliation, that is, from the point of view of the need to
restore the status quo ante which in this case was never disturbed.
“If despoiling cannot be proved then it logically follows
that urgency cannot rise.” Daily News
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