The Bulawayo High Court has nullified the election of Gift Banda as MDC-T’s Bulawayo provincial chairperson and ordered the party to conduct fresh elections following a successful application by his rival, Matson Hlalo challenging the conduct and outcome of the vote.
Justice Maxwell Takuva said Banda did not qualify to be candidate for the MDC-T’s Bulawayo provincial chairmanship in terms of the party’s constitution.
He said in the event that Hlalo was the only candidate remaining for the post of chairmanship, he should be declared as duly elected chairperson by virtue of Banda’s disqualification .
“The election conducted by MDC-T and the election of fourth respondent (Gift Banda) as Bulawayo province chairperson for the party is hereby set aside. Banda does not qualify as and is thus disqualified to be candidate for the provincial chairmanship in terms of Article 5.5.2 (b) of the MDC-T constitution,” said Justice Takuva.
He ordered the party to conduct fresh elections using the properly constituted structures.
Hlalo, who is the applicant in the matter, sought a court order that overturned the MDC-T Bulawayo provincial elections in which he lost to Banda, also the city’s deputy mayor, citing irregularities. Justice Takuva ordered the Morgan Tsvangirai-led party to conduct fresh elections using proper structures and database in line with the MDC-T’s national congress template.
According to the application filed last month, the respondents were cited as the MDC-T, the party’s presiding officer and chairperson of the national organising committee, the party’s national chairman Lovemore Moyo and Banda.
Hlalo through his lawyer, Godfrey Nyoni, sought the nullification of Banda’s election as Bulawayo provincial chairperson arguing that internal party processes challenging the election outcome could not afford him a fair hearing. He alleged that the elections that saw Banda winning by 707 votes against his 413 were marred by violence, vote-buying and reports of ballot-stuffing. Hlalo accused the elections’ presiding officer of creating parallel structures in order to rig the polls.
He dismissed the results as a sham and accused Tsvangirai of personally accrediting delegates to deliberately rig elections in favour of Banda. Hlalo said there was bias and partiality on the part of the presiding officer.
His grounds of review also revolved around illegitimate people he claimed were allowed to enter the polling station to vote.
“The exercise denied the legitimate chosen members the right to vote and instead illegitimate members voted in breach of the spirit and letter of Clause 11 of the national congress template of the party’s own constitution,” said Hlalo.
Douglas Mwonzora, the party’s recently-elected organising secretary, who was representing the respondents argued that the elections were conducted in a fair and transparent manner. The Chronicle
