Judgment No. CCZ 6/2016 4
Const. Application No CCZ 28/14
or implementing any mandatory provision of the Constitution. This right exists
and should exist whether or not that breach or omission is outside Chapter 4, of
the Constitution of Zimbabwe. Put in simple terms, a citizen’s right to approach
this Honourable Court cannot and should not be restricted to a complaint
founded on breach of the declaration of rights that are set out in Chapter 4 of
the Constitution of Zimbabwe.
9.3 Besides, to the extent that I have in fact alleged a breach of a fundamental right, I
have a right to approach this Honourable Court as I hereby do in terms of
Section 85 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe. Section 85 (1) (a) and (d), being
the specific legs that I bring this application should it be restricted to the narrow
question of breach of declaration of the rights defined in Chapter 4 of the
Constitution of Zimbabwe.”
[5] The applicant’s stance is thus twofold.
Firstly, he, as a Member of Parliament is
automatically entitled to be a member of the Bulawayo Metropolitan Province. By virtue of
s 269(1) (c) all members of the National Assembly whose constituencies fall within the
Metropolitan Province concerned, are automatic members of the Metropolitan Council. Thus
his constitutional right as bestowed by s 269 has been denied by the respondents’ failure to
enact the legislation in question.
More specifically, the applicant has been denied the
“responsibility and duty for the social and economic development activities in the province.
This includes the right to co-ordinate and implement governmental programs in the province,
the right to plan and implement measures for the conservation, implementation and
management of natural resources in the province and of course the right to promote tourism
in the province”. Accordingly, so the applicant avers, he has the right to approach this Court
for the constitutional mandamus sought in the draft order because the respondents are in
breach of “not only the provisions of Chapter 14 by default, but are acting against the concept
of a paradismic state as defined and captured in s 8 of the Constitution”.
[6]
The second ground on which he bases his locus standi is that in denying him the
benefit of Chapter 14 of the Constitution, the respondents are “in fact breaching not only