Vice President Phelekezela lost his $50 million lawsuit against the Associated Newspapers of Zimbabwe (ANZ) for the second time. ANZ are the publishers of the Daily News. Judge Lavender Makoni dismissed the VP’s appeal against an earlier dismissal. The case was previously dismissed by Judge Joseph Musakwa after Mphoko failed to attend a pretrial conference (PTC) in person.
In her ruling Judge Makoni said:
The urgent chamber application by the applicant is dismissed and the applicant is ordered to pay the respondents wasted costs … the applicant used the wrong procedure in seeking to rescind judgment.
The pre-trial conference is not a formality. It is an essential part of the proceedings and the judge will have put aside other work and studied the pleadings in order to prepare for the conference. It is therefore in the extreme to wait until the time scheduled to advise the court that parties are unable to attend
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