CZI boss fights sexual abuse penalty

News
Former Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries (CZI) president Farai Zizhou has once again petitioned the Supreme Court seeking permission to challenge a judgement that ordered him to pay $500 000 to a victim of sexual abuse.

BY CHARLES LAITON

Former Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries (CZI) president Farai Zizhou has once again petitioned the Supreme Court seeking permission to challenge a judgement that ordered him to pay $500 000 to a victim of sexual abuse.

Zizhou was on October 30, 2018 ordered by the Supreme Court to compensate Rita Marque-Mbatha, the Women’s Comfort Corner Foundation director, for unlawfully firing her from CZI.

Zizhou was, in terms of the law, supposed to file his plea against the claim within 10 days of the Supreme Court order, but failed to do so.

According to court papers Marque-Mbatha was unfairly dismissed from employment by Zizhou sometime in June 2013 after she refused to give in to his sexual advances.

Marque-Mbatha, who is also a board member of the International Alliance of Women, took CZI and Zizhou to the Labour Court, but the matter was dismissed by the High Court.

She then appealed to the Supreme Court where three judges — Justices Elizabeth Gwaunza, Bharat Patel and Vernanda Ziyambi — ruled in her favour and upheld her appeal and ordered Zizhou and CZI to pay her $500 000 in compensation.

But in his current application Zizhou said he filed his plea on November 14, 2018 and that the delay in filing the plea was neither “wilful nor inordinate”.

“An application for condonation was filed in the High Court under HC11543/18. However, it was noted later that this was not the correct procedure to follow as the time in which to file was stipulated in an order of this court.

“Therefore, only this court has the power to grant condonation,” he said through his lawyer Roselyn Mhlanga.

The matter is pending.