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Development Minister Obert Mpofu has said.
He said any litigation processes should include the Government-appointed administrator, Mr Afaras Gwaradzimba.
Minister Mpofu was responding to litigation launched against him by businessman Mutumwa Mawere, the former owner of the asbestos mines.
Minister Mpofu said it was wrong for the him to be taken to court on issues to do with SMM as reconstruction laws administered under Justice and Legal Affairs Minister Patrick Chinamasa had not been revoked.
Mr Mawere had cited the minister in reference to media reports that the mines ministry had taken over the administration and management of SMM through the Zimbabwe Mining Development Corporation.
Minister Mpofu recently addressed journalists to announce that the running of SMM had been transferred to his ministry.
At the Press conference, Minister Mpofu had indicated that his ministry would manage SMM through the ZMDC.
But in his opposing affidavit, Minister Mpofu contends that Mr Mawere’s application was defective in that it excluded Mr Gwaradzimba and Justice Minister Chinamasa who administers the Reconstruction of State Indebted Companies Act.
“As the Minister of Mines, my responsibilities are to administer specific acts assigned to me. SMM is currently under reconstruction in terms of the Reconstruction Act, which Act is under the administration of the Minister of Justice. It has not been established in the application why I have been cited and how I would effect the order sought,” he said.
“The newspaper article referred to has no legal force in matters of Government. This is a classical case of misjoinder on my part and non-joinder on the part of the Minister of Justice and Legal Affairs. Failure to cite him is fatal to Mawere’s case.”
The minister explained in his response how SMM was placed under reconstruction in 2004, and the work that had been done by the administrator in defending several litigation cases raised by Mr Mawere.
In the same response, Mr Gwaradzimba has made an application to be included in the litigation, arguing that he had direct substantial interest in the outcome of the case.
Mr Mawere, who was despecified by the Co-Ministers of Home Affairs last year, sued Minister Mpofu in a bid to reclaim his assets.
He premised his litigation on newspaper articles carried by several local newspapers in which Minister Mpofu and his deputy, Mr Gift Chimanikire said they had assumed management of the mining giant.
In some of the articles, Mr Chimanikire said he had even visited the mine in the Midlands province and expressed hope that ZMDC had the capacity to revive the mining firm whose fortunes nose-dived over the years.
Mr Chimanikire had also indicated in another platform that the legal disputes had been concluded, which Mr Mawere dismissed as “false”.
Bongani Ndlovu