DISTRIBUTED BY VERITAS TRUST Tel: [263] [4] 794478 Fax & Messages [263] [4] 793592 E-mail: veritas@mango.zw Veritas makes every effort to ensure the provision of reliable information, but cannot take legal responsibility for information supplied. Judgment No. SC 36/18 Civil Appeal No. SC 279/16 premised firstly, on the indemnity document executed and signed by the appellant on the day the vehicles were retrieved and, secondly, on the delay between the repossession of the vehicles and the filing of the application for a mandament van spolie for their recovery. The appellant has appealed the findings in question on the premise that he was unlawfully dispossessed and, further, that the delay in instituting the proceedings was reasonable in the circumstances as he was facing criminal charges and could not breach the conditions of the charges in question. The court a quo, correctly in my view, came to the conclusion that the lawfulness of his possession was not a factor for consideration in an application for a mandement van spolie brought on the specific facts before the court. In an application for spoliation the court does not decide what the rights of the parties to the property were before the alleged spoliation. The only factors to consider were the possession and whether or not the appellant had been unlawfully deprived of the property in question. See Magadzire v Magadzire SC 197/98 wherein this court stated that spoliation had nothing to do with rights of ownership, but was concerned solely with possession and the unlawful deprivation thereof. In a claim for a mandament van spolie, an applicant needs to establish the following: i) that he or she was in peaceful and undisturbed possession; and ii) that he or she was forcibly or wrongly deprived of such possession. 3