Judgment No. CCZ 9/2016 44 Const. Application No. CCZ 316/2012 obligation to make its services available throughout the country. Failure by the ZBC to fulfil its mandate does not mean that the law by which the obligation is imposed is unconstitutional. The contention was that s 38(b)(1) of the Act violates the applicants’ right to freedom of expression because it has the effect of prohibiting possession of appliances for receiving programmes broadcast by television and radio. The applicants overlooked an important point relating to the nature of the constitutional power of taxation exercised by the legislature. In the exercise of the constitutional power of taxation, the legislature has an absolute discretion to select an activity or conduct and not others, as a subject of taxation. In this case it selected receivers and chose to prohibit their possession without a listener’s licence as the subject of taxation. The Legislature may prescribe the basis of tax, fix the value and require payment as it may deem proper. Within the limits of the constitutional power, it is supreme in its action. McCray v United States 195 US 27 at 57. The fact that other motives may impel the exercise of taxation power does not authorize the courts to inquire into that subject. Whether the choice of the activity or conduct as a subject of taxation, has the burdensome regulatory effect of restricting the activity or conduct in relation to the use of the appliance as a means of exercising freedom of expression by receiving broadcasting service from a provider of one’s choice, cannot be investigated by the Court. Every tax is in some measure regulatory in effect. To some extent it interposes an economic impediment to the activity or conduct taxed as compared with others not taxed. But a tax is not any the less a tax because it has a regulatory effect.