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remain in force until an application for rescission of default judgment is determined.
Rtd Maj-Gen Bonyongwe attached mining equipment and other property at ACR offices in Harare after he won a US$10 million defamation suit against the firm’s director Mr Andrew Cranswick late last year.
Both parties’ lawyers yesterday appeared before High Court judge Justice Ben Hlatshwayo and signed a consent order to have the property remain attached until the application to rescind the previous order is determined.
Mr Jonathan Samukange of Venturas and Samukange is acting for Mr Cranswick while Scanlen and Holdernes law firm is representing Rtd Maj-Gen Bonyongwe.
The law firm said Rtd Maj-Gen Bonyongwe was not interested in money but his reputation which was injured. They told Justice Hlatshwayo that they had reached an agreement with Cranswick’s lawyer Mr Samukange that the mining equipment and other property remained attached until the matter was finalised.
Rtd Major Gen Bonyongwe had sued Mr Cranswick over a WikiLeaks report that linked him to alleged diamond looting in Chiadzwa.
Justice Hlatshwayo granted a default judgment against Mr Cranswick with costs of suit. The Deputy Sheriff then attached the property from ACR’s Herbert Chitepo Avenue offices but was yet to remove it from the premises for auctioning.
The property, according to a notice of attachment, includes two combined gold catchers, 14 sieves, a 10 000-litre tank, fridges, generators, plasma television sets, furniture and many others.
Mr Cranswick filed an urgent chamber application at the same court seeking to stop the removal of the property from ACR premises.
He deposed an affidavit from Gauteng in South Africa seeking to stop the removal and subsequent sale of the attached property.
Mr Cranswick indicated in his affidavit that he was never served with the summons for the US$10 million defamation.
The letter quoted a portion of the WikiLeaks report that reads: “Cranswick said that RBZ Governor Gideon Gono, Grace Mugabe, wife of President Robert Mugabe, Vice President Joice Mujuru, (the then) Mines and Mining Development Minister Amos Midzi, General Constantine Chiwenga and wife Jocelyn, CIO director Happyton Bonyongwe, Manicaland Governor Chris Mushohwe and several white Zimbabweans including Ken Sharpe, Greg Scott and Hendrick O’Neill, are involved in the Marange diamond trade.”
It was Rtd Maj-Gen Bonyongwe’s contention that the report was false and he was never involved in any illegal trade of diamonds from Chiadzwa.
Online Reporter