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Court bars Harare from evicting Porta families
Kumbirai Mafunda, The Financial Gazette (Zimbabwe)
November 09, 2006

http://www.fingaz.co.zw/story.aspx?stid=1908

A HARARE magistrate has issued an order barring the Harare City Council from evicting 37 families from Porta Farm Extension, about 10 kilometres outside Harare.

Magistrate Marevanazvo Gofa confirmed an earlier provisional court interdict, granted by the same court last month, into a final order.

Last month, officials from the Harare City Council supported by workers at the Kuwadzana District Office served the residents of Porta Farm Extension, who have occupied their homes for the past decade, with notices to vacate the premises within 24 hours after declaring them illegal tenants.

But Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) successfully challenged the evictions on behalf of the residents and won a temporary interdict barring the authorities from evicting the residents and demolishing their properties.

Tafadzwa Mugabe of ZLHR told The Financial Gazette that on Tuesday Gofa issued a final order barring the council from evicting the residents and demolishing their homes.

"The final order declares the residents legitimate and legal tenants of the City of Harare and the HCC and the district officer are barred from demolishing or removing them from their properties without due process," said Mugabe.

The ruling comes after the local authority had embarked on a fresh blitz on "illegal" structures in the city.

The court order spares the families exposure to the summer rains, which have pounded some parts of the city recently.

The city council’s bid to evict people from Porta came at a time when many victims of the infamous Operation Murambatsvina are still sleeping in the open.

Humanitarian and aid agencies say hundreds of Zimbabweans are still living in makeshift shelter as a result of last year’s large-scale demolition exercise which, according to the United Nations, (UN) left 700 000 people without shelter.

The demolition spree also robbed about 2.4 million people of their sources of livelihood after police razed to the ground what the government described as illegal structures in Harare and other towns, in the middle of an unprecedented economic crisis.

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