Suspension of Court Operations During Covid Lock-down

COURT WATCH 16/2021

[12th August]

Suspension of Court Operations During Covid Lock-down

When we analysed the latest amendments to the COVID-19 lock-down in Bill Watch 56/2021 of the 4th August, we said that nothing had been done to legalise the suspension of court operations during the lock-down.  We were wrong.  A reader has kindly pointed out that the Chief Justice issued Practice Direction 7 of 2021 on the 28th July, in which he ordered that, in relation to all courts:

• The filing of new cases, process, documents, pleadings and papers is suspended until the 19 August 2021, “unless the period is earlier extended or revoked”.

Comment:  The meaning of the words we have put in inverted commas is not clear.  The current Level IV lock-down is due to end on the 24th August and may well be extended further.  Will the suspension period for filing court papers be automatically extended, or will it end on the 19th August?

• Time-limits for filing of papers and other actions relating to court proceedings are to be calculated from the 19th August.
• Where a time-limit had already started to run on the 28th July, the remaining period of the time-limit is to be calculated from the 19th August.
• Postponement of cases:
• Civil cases set down for or postponed to a date specified in the first column of the following table are rolled over to the date specified opposite it in the second column.
• Criminal cases originally remanded to a date specified in the first column of the following table are rolled over to the date specified opposite it in the second column.

Comment:  All these dates are based on the assumption that the period during which the Practice Direction is operative will end on the 19th August.  If that period is extended, these dates will have to be altered.

The Practice Direction can be accessed on the Veritas website [link].

BILL WATCH 60/2021

[12th August 2021]

Public Health Lock-down Order : Extension of Lock-down

The thirty-second amendment to the Lock-down Order was published on the 11th August, in SI 214 of 2021, and can be accessed on the Veritas website [link].  Its effect is simply to extend the Level IV lock-down until the 24th August.  The special lock-downs imposed in Hurungwe, Kariba, Kwekwe and Makonde districts are also extended to the 24th August.

What this means is that, for the duration of the extended lock-down (that is, until the 24th August):

Intercity transport is prohibited throughout the country except for:

• the carriage of staff, goods and equipment needed for essential services
• the carriage of sick persons to hospitals and other health care providers
• travel by foreign diplomats or by foreigners seeking assistance from their countries’ diplomatic missions
• the transport of food, fuel, basic goods and medical supplies
• the carriage of police officers, Defence Force personnel and public health officials, and
• the carriage of staff, goods and equipment needed for the operation of tobacco auction floors.

Schools, colleges, universities and polytechnics are closed, except for:

• institutions providing on-line or distance education, and
• institutions providing medical training or research useful in combating COVID-19.

Other Measures Announced by the Cabinet have Not Yet been Given Legal Effect:

• Opening of Victoria Falls and Kazungula Border Posts:  Cabinet agreed on the 27th July that the border posts at Victoria Falls and Kazungula would be opened to tourists who were fully vaccinated.  There is nothing to this effect in the latest amendments.
• Opening of churches:  At its meeting yesterday the Cabinet announced that churches could allow congregants who had received two vaccine doses to attend services, so long as “all Ministry of Health and Child Care and WHO protocols are adhered to”.  This brief announcement leaves some points uncertain:
• How many congregants can attend a church service?  Is attendance limited to 50 congregants, as provided by section 5(1)(j) of the Lock-down Order, or can an unlimited number attend?
• What exactly are the protocols that must be adhered to?  Presumably the congregants must observe social distancing and have their hands sanitised, but must the church premises be disinfected between services?
• To what extent does the announcement apply to mosques, synagogues and other non-Christian places of worship, and to places where open-air services are held?

When the Lock-down Order is amended to give legal effect to the Cabinet’s announcement – and we hope that will be done very soon – these points will need to be clarified.

A consolidated version of the Lock-down Order, incorporating the latest amendments, can be accessed on the Veritas website [link].

BILL WATCH 59/2021

[12th August 2021]

The New Standard Scale of Fines

On the 30th July a new Standard Scale of Fines Notice was published in SI 209 of 2021, replacing an earlier invalid notice which we criticised in Bill Watch 3/2021 of the 28th January 2021.  The new notice can be accessed on the Veritas website [link], as can Bill Watch 3/2021 [link].

Background to the Notice

As we explained in Bill Watch 3/2021, when our statutes prescribe fines as punishments for criminal offences, they do not specify monetary amounts – which diminish in value over time because of inflation – but rather they are set as levels on a Standard Scale set out in the First Schedule to the Criminal Law Code.  Thus a level 1 fine might be Z$200 according to the Standard Scale, a level 2 fine might be ZWL$300, and so on in increasing amounts all the way up to level 14.  According to section 280 of the Code the monetary amounts in the Standard Scale can be amended through a statutory instrument, which is a much quicker process than amending individual fines by separate Acts of Parliament.  So if, for example, the Minister publishes a statutory instrument stating that level 1 fines are to be increased to $1 000, the amendment will automatically increase the amounts in every statute that provides for a fine of level 1 to be imposed.

The New Notice

The new notice fixes the lowest level of fines (level 1) at Z$500 and the highest (level 14) at Z$500 000.  Both these amounts, and those fixed for the intermediate levels, are much lower than the amounts fixed in the repealed invalid notice – between half and a quarter, in fact.

Level 3 is fixed at Z$2 000.  This is important, because it is the level at which so-called spot fines are fixed in terms of the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Act.  Section 141 of that Act states that “peace officers” – and police officers are peace officers – can issue notices commonly called “tickets” to people who have committed offences such as minor traffic violations for which they are unlikely to receive a sentence of more than level 3.  The notices call on the person concerned to appear in a magistrates court on a specified date to face a charge of committing the offence, but says that, if the person is prepared to admit the offence, he or she can pay the specified fine – which must not exceed level 3 – at a police station and so avoid the trouble and inconvenience of appearing in court.

By fixing level 3 at Z$2 000, the new notice limits the fines that can be imposed through tickets to Z$2 000 or, if the accused person so chooses, the equivalent in US dollars at the official rate (which is currently about US$24).  Heavier fines can be imposed only by courts.

One further point should be noted.  Section 141 of the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Act does not give police officers power to demand that fines be paid in cash on the spot.  There is nothing illegal about a driver voluntarily paying a fine on the spot, though he or she should insist on a proper receipt, but a police officer cannot insist on such payment and an officer who does is guilty of extortion – a very serious offence.  The driver must be given the option of going to a police station to pay the fine.

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