BY CHARLES LAITON
MORE than 250 families belonging to six housing co-operatives based at Crowborough Farm in Harare are set to be evicted and their houses demolished after their application seeking to bar the City of Harare from removing them from the property recently hit a snag.
Some 229 co-operative members had appealed to the High Court for recourse after their executive members allegedly colluded with the City of Harare and obtained an order by consent authorising the eviction of all the members from the farm and the demolition of their houses.
High Court judge Justice Pisirayi Kwenda heard the matter on November 12, 2019 and dismissed it.
One V Mazhetese appeared for the families.
According to the court papers, the affected housing co-operatives are Igarwe, Tatakura, Nyabira, Pastors, Vanhuvatema and Ideal Homes.
One member of Igarwe Housing Co-operative, Brian Muzembe, who deposed an affidavit which was filed alongside the urgent chamber application, said he was shocked when he received the news of evictions and demolitions from their councillor, adding that none of the executive members of all the co-operatives had alerted their members of what they had agreed on with the Harare City Council.
Muzembe said he, together with the 228 others, bought the stands in 2014 and were encouraged to put up structures on their stands while waiting for the regularisation of the stands.
Muzembe further said it had been suggested that all the co-operative’s stands were pegged illegally on the council’s land and that the occupants had erected structures on top of the council’s water pipes.
