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| author/source:Herald (Zimb) |
| published:Mon 8-Feb-2010 |
| posted on this site:Mon 8-Feb-2010 |
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| Article Type : News |
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| The Supreme Court will determine who owns the River Ranch diamond claims |
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Court Reporter
The battle for control of diamond claims at River Ranch took a new twist last week when the Supreme Court reinstated Bubye Minerals’ appeal seeking to quash a High Court decision that declared River Ranch Limited the rightful owners of the disputed mine. The Supreme Court ruling, which reinstated the appeal, suspends Justice Lawrence Kamocha’s judgment dismissing BM’s claim to Special Grant 1278. BM claimed ownership of the special grant that gave mining rights to RRL. This sparked a fierce legal battle between the two mining companies. RRL won the case in the High Court and BML challenged the lower court’s decision at the Supreme Court. The Registrar of the High Court in March 2007 wrote to the lawyers stating that their appeal had lapsed and that the judgment that favoured RRL was now in force. This prompted BM to challenge the Registrar’s decision in the Supreme Court.
Deputy Chief Justice Luke Malaba, who presided over the case with Justices Wilson Sandura and Misheck Cheda, accepted BM’s arguments and nullified the Registrar of the High Court’s letter. The net effect of the nullification is that the claim is legally disputed and the Supreme Court will determine who owns the River Ranch diamond claims. As it stands now no party has clear legal title to the mine. The issue for determination in the present case was whether or not the lawyers acting for BM had inspected the record of appeal. The court also had to determine whether the registrar of the High Court was correct in determining that BM’s appeal had lapsed as a result of a failure to inspect the record. However, the Supreme Court took less than an hour to deliver a unanimous judgment.
"The High Court registrar has no powers, in the circumstances, to write the letter of March 2 2007. In any case, even if there had been a failure to inspect the record by the lawyers, it did not fall upon the Registrar of the High Court to notify the appellant that its appeal was deemed to have been abandoned. In that regard, the letter of March 2, 2007 to notify the appellant that the appeal was deemed to have been abandoned is null and void. The judgment of the court a-quo is set aside," the court ruled. The court also set aside Justice Alfas Chitakunye’s judgment that upheld the registrar of the High Court’s conduct. It further ordered the registrar to transmit the record of appeal to the Supreme Court within seven days of the ruling. The Supreme Court registrar is now required to set down the appeal as a matter of urgency. RRL had, however, been mining since 2006. Advocate Happias Zhou instructed by Mr Terrence Hussein of Hussein, Ranchhod and Company appeared for BM, while Adv Richard Fitches acted for RRL.
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