Lecturers take ministry to top court in test case

Zimbabwean lecturers are to initiate a test case in the Constitutional Court, established six months ago to protect academic, labour and other rights. Their decision to act came after the Ministry of Higher and Tertiary Education, Science and Technology defied court orders to reverse its decision to suspend, fine or transfer 31 lecturers following a strike.

Lecturers have been winning cases against the government in batches – and now the ministry is in contempt for ignoring all the court orders against it.

Two of the lecturers involved have since died, according to the College Lecturers Association of Zimbabwe, COLAZ, which says it has also taken the matter to the International Labour Organisation.

Some of the transferred academics are couples but have been placed in jobs in different provinces, in violation of the ministry’s own policy, the country’s HIV-AIDS policy and the rights of children not to be separated from their parents, the association added.

Both the Labour Court and the High Court have ruled in favour of the lecturers, and an attempt by the ministry to appeal has failed – but the authorities have still declined to obey the courts’ orders.

Zimbabwe adopted a new constitution last May that gives citizens greater liberties. The new constitution also created a Constitutional Court, which is now the highest court in the land, and lecturers want to approach it for the first time to protect their rights.

“This is a violation of human, labour and academic rights. There is a first time for everything... this is the beginning and the first time we will be approaching the Constitutional Court,” said COLAZ last week.

The union said its constitutional case would be against a number of administrators in the ministry.

The new constitution says everybody is entitled to freedom of profession, trade and occupation, and grants labour rights that include the right to fair and safe labour practices as well as the right to administrative conduct that is lawful, prompt, reasonable, proportionate and procedurally fair.

The constitution further states that the state has a duty to give effect to those rights.

The new constitution was adopted during the era of the unity government between Movement for Democratic Change Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and President Robert Mugabe to give citizens greater rights.

But after Mugabe won a further presidential term on 31 July, it has been proven that old habits die hard as lecturer and student rights alike continue to be violated.

Last week the group Students Solidarity said a Great Zimbabwe University student would appear in court for publicly undermining the authority of or insulting the president.

The matter is likely to be thrown out as the Constitutional Court last month declared the so-called ‘insult laws’ unconstitutional and warned the police and prosecutors not to be overzealous about people who comment on Mugabe “in drinking halls and other social places”.