Jeremiah Bamu should publicly share the High Court's response

JEREMIAH BAMU SHOULD PUBLICLY SHARE THE HIGH COURT'S RESPONSE TO HIS WIDELY PUBLICISED 9 DECEMBER LETTER WITH SCURRILOUS ALLEGATIONS AGAINST THE COURT

When a lawyer who is handling a case in a court of law, where every procedure is according to the rules of the court, takes the matter out of court and brings it to the court of public opinion, the risk of turning the matter into a circus is very high.

This is the risk taken by Mr Bamu last week on 9 December.

It is worse if or when the matter is taken to a political meeting of a political party, where the lawyer takes the podium to join his fellow ranting-politicians, such as the settings captured on the attached video clip; featuring Honourable Agency Gumbo, a lawyer with Curious & Company who is also a CCC Chamisa party politician and a Member of Parliament.

The settings, and the ensuing circus, can be comical, to say the least.

Consequently, what Honourable Gumbo is saying on the attached video clip should be taken with bags of salt, not least, in fact, because, while he is a lawyer, he is also a politician with vested political interests speaking not in or outside a court of law but at a charged political function of his beleaguered political party, which currently has its back against the wall.

For this reason and for the sake of balance and objectivity, given his manifestly outlandish claims, in support of Mr Bamu's claims, it is important to take what he is claiming against the backdrop of the following independently verified facts which contradict his claims, and which can be independently confirmed:

Honourable Gumbo was indeed not on the virtual hearing of the case before Justice Muzenda, on Friday night. He could not have been.

Whilst he jointly signed the notice of appeal with Muchadehama, it's a verifiable fact that he did not give his client's address of service as Curious & Company Attorneys but he gave that of Mbidzo Muchadehama & Makoni. As such, service on that firm was proper and adequate.

But even so, verifiable information also shows that apparently out of an abundance of caution the urgent chamber application was also served at Curious & Company Attorneys, in the letter box; because when the lawyers who did the service got there, the law firm's offices were literally deserted.

There's proof of this fact on the court record. In fact, a copy of the certificate of service that was filed in court has an annexure "a"; which is a photo of one of the lawyers who did the service, placing the application in the letter box at Curious & Company.

But critically important, service of the notice of set down was on the IECMS platform; through Mbidzo Muchadehama & Makoni Attorneys.

It was Honourable Gumbo's free choice, to have Muchadehama's law firm as his client's address for service.

Last but not last, and this is very important given Honourable Gumbo's unrestrained claims on the attached video clip, the High Court in Harare has today provided a detailed response to Mr Jeremiah Bamu's letter of 9 December 2023 in which he made scurrilous allegations against the Registrar of the High Court in Harare, and Justice Muzenda.

The High Court response has been served on all the litigants in the case and all the lawyers of record in the case; and it also has been issued and is available as a public document on the portal.

It would serve the interests of justice, an certainly the public interest, if Honourable Gumbo's colleagues, particularly if Mr Bamu shared with the public, like he did his letter, the High Court response to his most unfortunate allegations, which turn out not to have been founded at all!