No other remedy for Kasukuwere as ConCourt upholds his election ban

Former cabinet Minister Saviour Kasukuwere’s application for direct access to the Constitutional Court (ConCourt) in the case he is challenging his ban from contesting in the presidential race has been denied.

This means that Kasukuwere no longer has any legal remedy to be placed back on the ballot because the ConCourt is the highest court in all constitutional matters and its decisions on constitutional matters bind all other courts in Zimbabwe.

In their ruling, Justices Rita Makarau, Elizabeth Gwaunza and Paddington Garwe said Kasukuwere “failed to demonstrate that the Supreme Court did not act in accordance with the law.”

Kasukuwere, a former Zanu-PF political commissar, wanted to challenge President Emmerson Mnangagwa in the upcoming harmonised elections as an independent presidential candidate.

He was blocked by the High Court which upheld Zanu-PF activist Lovedale Mangwana’s application for Kasukuwere’s candidature to be nullified on the basis that he was out of the country for more than 18 months.

Kasukuwere then unsuccessfully appealed the High Court decision at the Supreme Court. The ConCourt’s decision is final, effectively meaning that the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) will not print his name on the ballots.

The former Zanu-PF MP fled the country in November 2017 after Mnangagwa’s military coup that ousted the late former President Robert Mugabe.

He escaped the country together with his colleagues Walter Mzembi, Patrick Zhuwao and Jonathan Moyo who were opposed to Mnangagwa’s succession plan.

They were all senior Zanu-PF officials whose camp was called the “G-40” during the peak of ruling party factionalism.

Mnangagwa’s group was called the “Lactose”.

Moyo and Zhuwao have since apologised to Zanu-PF for supporting opposition leader Nelson Chamisa during the 2018 election. They were not clear in their letter if they wanted to come back to Zimbabwe and rejoin Zanu PF.