Purported People’s Democratic Party (PDP) secretary-general Benjamin Rukanda has filed an urgent chamber application with the High Court challenging Justice Amy Tsanga’s ruling which nullified the expulsion of Tendai Biti and other former members of PDP from Parliament.
Justice Tsanga had ruled that Rukanda, who caused the
expulsion of the six PDP members, was not a legitimate official of the PDP.
Rukanda now wants an order stopping the execution of the judgment, arguing that
the legislators could not be representatives in a party they no longer belong
to.
Rukanda cited PDP officials Kucaca Ivumile Phulu,
Settlement Chikwinya, Jacob Mafume, Arnold Batirai Dune, Simon Chanukah,
Williams Madzimure, Regai Tsunga, Chelesile Mahlangu and the PDP led by Biti as
first to ninth respondents, respectively.
Local Government minister July Moyo, Speaker of the
National Assembly Jacob Mudenda, Parliament of Zimbabwe and the Zimbabwe
Electoral Commission were cited as the 10th to 13th respondents, respectively.
“Their interests are now at MDC Alliance and a default
judgment was handed down because I was not served with their urgent chamber
application,” Rukanda’s lawyer Everson Chatambudza submitted.
“The respondents obtained a default judgment against the
second applicant on April 14, 2021 under case HC 5292/29. The applicants have
filed an application for recession of the default order under case 1551/21
challenging the default order. The matter is still pending before the
honourable court.
“The effect of the order is to render all other pending
matters academic on a technicality without dealing with the real dispute
between the parties on merits.
“The default order declared the second respondent, who
defected to another political party as the secretary-general (Chikwinya), whose
interests he is no longer representing, hence first applicant would suffer
irreparable harm. Further ninth (Mahlangu), 11th (Mudenda) and 12th
(Parliament) respondents might act according to the default order to the
detriment of the applicants,” said Chatambudza.
“Upon verification, it was discovered that the purported
summons upon which the default judgment was based had not been served on me at
the time they were issued as alleged.
“Further, when I obtained a copy of the urgent chamber
application from the High Court for the purposes of preparing an opposition to
the confirmation of the provisional order, the summons had not been served on
me. To make matters worse, when my legal practitioners filed the opposing
papers to the confirmation, not the provisional order, the summons had not been
served.”
Rukanda’s lawyer said the summons were served under strange
circumstances “when the respondent knew very well that I was legally
represented with my current lawyer”. Newsday
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