Supreme Court Dismisses Former CCC MPs' Appeal
Recalled CCC Members of Parliament (MPs) are set to refile their appeal at the Supreme Court for the third time after their latest application was dismissed for failing to pay US$5 000 security costs, reported NewZimbabwe.com.
The former MPs, who were recalled by Sengezo Tshabangu in October 2023, had their first application removed from the roll for being fatally defective in December of that year.
On Thursday 22 February, a three-panel bench chaired by Supreme Court judge, Justice Elizabeth Gwaunza, sitting with Antonia Guvava and Alphius Chitakunye said the former lawmakers should pay US$5 000 as security for costs for their case to be heard.
Speaking to journalists after court proceedings, Advocate Amanda Ndlovu who is representing the former MPs, said failure to pay was not wilful. She added:
We still have not yet been heard on the merits. The appeal has not been dismissed, which means that we still have to sort out the issue of security costs before coming back to court for an appeal.
Ngobani Ndlovu, who is representing Tshabangu, said the rules of the court were violated and hence the court could not hear the matter.
In December 2023, the Supreme Court ruled the application filed by the former legislators was defective after lawyers failed to comply with the rules of the court in filing the papers.
The lawyers did not cite the other parties involved at the High Court as respondents.
The Supreme Court said parties before the High Court were supposed to be the same before the apex court.
There were two notices of appeal before the Supreme Court.
One was filed on behalf of the first batch of 14 members of the National Assembly who were recalled by Tshabangu and another by the four senators recalled at the same time.
When the appeals were filed separately, those recalled from the Senate were not cited in the appeal filed by the former members of the National Assembly and vice versa.
This was despite the cases having been consolidated for a ruling before the High Court.
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