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Midlands Correspondent
THE High Court sitting in Harare yesterday threw out an appeal by the MDC-T in which it sought to compel the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC)to disqualify outgoing Gweru Mayor, Mr Tedious Chimombe, from contesting in the harmonised elections after he filed his nomination papers with a symbol deemed to resemble that of the MDC-T.
Chronicle is in possession of a copy of the appeal in which the MDC-T also wanted the High Court to have the open palm symbol removed on the nomination papers of out going Gweru Deputy Mayor, Mr Taurai Demo and four other councillors’ after it emerged that the five also used the palm symbol when they filed their papers with the Nomination Court on Friday.
Mr Chimombe who was fired from MDC-T party is set to contest the Gweru Urban House of Assembly seat as an independent candidate while Mr Demo and three other outgoing Gweru councillors, Mr Kumbirai Rutsvara, Mr Trust Chineni, Mr Trynos Makumbe and Mr Canaan Dzingiso are set to contest as independent in their respective council wards.
Mr Demo was also fired from the MDC-T while Mr Makumbe, Mr Rutsvara, Mr Dzingiso and Mr Chineni were on suspension.
“Take notice that the appellant, the Movement for Democratic Change led by Dr MT hereby notes an appeal against the decision of the Nomination Court taken in its sitting in Gweru on 28 June 2013 in respect of which second to seventh respondents, being independent candidates standing on their own were allowed to stand on the basis of a symbol that so closely resembles the recognised symbol and abbreviation of the MDC-T,” read part of the appeal written by the MDC-T lawyers, Atherstone and Cook Legal Practitioners.
In the summons, ZEC was cited as the first respondent while Mr Chimombe was the second respondent.
Mr Rutsvara, Mr Chineni, Mr Makumbe, Mr Dzingiso and Mr Demo were third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh respondents respectively. The MDC-T want the open palm symbol to be removed on all the respondents’ nomination papers.
Justice Bhunu who heard the matter yesterday, however, threw out the application arguing that the MDC-T candidates who were supposed to contest the concerned seats were supposed to have had lodged the complaints in their individual capacities and not MDC-T.
MDC-T spokesperson, Mr Douglas Mwonzora yesterday confirmed that party’s application had been rejected but said he was yet to get details of the reasons.
“I am yet to get details as to why the case was thrown away but it would be strange if the judge argued that the MDC-T was not supposed to be the complainant.
“It’s obvious we will file another appeal because the MDC-T as the custodian of that palm symbol is the concerned party. The symbol that Mr Chimombe and other councillors who were either fired or suspended is a registered symbol and even those councillors who are serving suspension but decided to contest as independent candidates should not associate themselves with the MDC-T registered symbol,” he said.
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