MDC legislator for Warren Park and University of Zimbabwe lecturer Shakespeare Hamauswa has petitioned the High Court seeking a court order to declare unconstitutional the Presidential (Temporary Measures) Act, which President Emmerson Mnangagwa evoked as the legal basis to introduce the RTGS$.
In his court application, Hamuswa cited in their official capacities, Mnangagwa, Minister of Finance and Economic Development, Mthuli Ncube and RBZ governor John Mangudya as respondents. Said Hamauswa:
It is my respectful contention that the Act, that is the Presidential (Temporal Measures) Act, is unconstitutional. This Act gives the sweeping powers to the President of making laws virtually on every subject….what this means is that the President has sweeping powers to make laws that are above even laws that have been made by Parliament.
… By issuing bond notes and RTGS currency at par with the US$ and then devaluing the same on February 20, 2019, the respondent has robbed us. Section 71 does not permit the expropriation of people’s property.
The net effect is that the third respondent and indeed the first respondent have devalued the RTGS$ balances by 2,5. The RTGS$ must, therefore, be set aside on the basis that it is an infringement of section 71 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe.