The Lovemore Matombo-led faction of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) has lost an appeal case against a High Court ruling that barred its leaders from representing the organisation and holding meetings in the name of the labour body.
The two factions emerged after Matombo and his followers declined to recognise the election of George Nkiwane as the new ZCTU leader. They formed a splinter group.
Nkiwane’s lawyer, Alec Muchadehama, told NewsDay yesterday the Supreme Court had dismissed Matombo’s appeal and upheld the Nkiwane-led faction as the legitimate workers’ representative body.
“ZCTU secretary-general Japhet Moyo and the president George Nkiwane went to court in 2011 to stop Matombo, (Raymond) Majongwe and affiliates from using ZCTU property and not to hold themselves to be office bearers of the ZCTU nor to hold meetings in the name of ZCTU,” Muchadehama said.
Majongwe is secretary-general of the Progressive Teachers’ Union of Zimbabwe which supports the Matombo-led ZCTU faction.
Muchadehama added: “They attempted to do this on 16 December 2011 and we got an order against them and they appealed to the Supreme Court and this was dismissed.
“The order which was granted by the High Court was that they were not supposed to use the name of ZCTU or hold meetings under that name.The general conference they held on 16 December was declared null and void by the High Court and this was the ruling they were appealing which they lost today (yesterday). The ZCTU is now represented by Nkiwane as the president and Japhet Moyo as the secretary-general.”
