BY ARNOLD FANDISO
THE Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) has withdrawn its urgent chamber application against the government yesterday after water and power shortages at Ngomahuru Mental Hospital in Masvingo were restored.
ZLHR said the application was withdrawn before Masvingo High Court judge Justice Sunsley Zisengwe after the Zimbabwe National Water Authority (Zinwa) and the Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution Company (ZETDC) lawyers deduced that water and electricity problems at the institution had been resolved.
“Zinwa lawyers Dondo and Partners told Justice Zisengwe that supply of water at Ngomahuru had been restored following restoration of electricity by ZETDC,” the human rights lawyers said.
Former Masvingo West legislator, Tachiona Chiminya (MDC-T), through his lawyer Martin Mureri, had taken government departments to court to force them to provide water at the mental hospital claiming inmates were being forced to bath in Magwagwaza River due to water shortages at the institution.
Chiminya said he decided to take the legal route because the situation at Ngomahuru, where both male and female patients were being forced to bath together in a nearby river, was untenable and an affront to human dignity.
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