Dispute over City toilets resolved

Mathew Masinge

HIGH Court Judge, Justice Rodgers Manyangadze, has restored rights to Disruptive Innovation (Pvt) Ltd, a private player, which was running the Mbare Musika and Market Square public toilets.

This follows a successful application for a spoliation order against the City of Harare, which had repossessed the rest rooms, without due process being followed.

Disruptive Innovation had obtained the lease to run the toilets from the City of Harare in 2015 before a recent public outcry that the private player was charging too much for the public to access the toilets at the busy markets.

The City of Harare Claimed the company had failed to clear its rental arrears.

Justice Manyangadze condemned the City of Harare’s conduct noting that it had violated its terms of the lease agreement.

“There was no court document cancelling the parties’ deed of settlement and ordering the removal of Disruptive Innovation.

“What happened was simply a matter of the City of Harare taking the law into its own hands.

“It dispossessed the company, without any lawful authority, who was in peaceful and undisturbed possession of the said premises,” reads parts of the judgment.

Justice Manyangadze ordered the city fathers to restore possession to the private company within a 48-hour period.

“The application for a spoliation order be and is hereby granted, the respondents and all those acting through them, within 48 hours of this order, restore to the applicants peaceful and undisturbed possession of the Mbare Musika and Market Square Bus Terminus toilets.

“City of Harare shall not remove Disruptive Innovation except in terms of a lawful process,” ruled the judge.

Officer commanding Police Mbare district, Trish Mukudu and Harare Metropolitan Province Provincial Development Coordinator Tafadzwa Muguti, were cited as respondents.