THE State has insisted on calling the chairperson of the Council for Legal Education Justice Sylvia Chirawu-Mugomba to give viva voce evidence in a case gospel musician Ivy Kombo and her husband Admire Kasi are being charged with fraudulently acquiring fake certificates to practise law in Zimbabwe.
Arguing before Harare regional magistrate Feresi Chakanyuka, prosecutor Anesu Chirenje said there was no law that stopped the State from calling a witness.
“In respect of the ruling made on May 8, the State fully abides. However, the State seeks to call the judge as a witness not court witness as we previously intended to do in the application,” Chirenje said.
Kombo and Kasi are being represented by Admire Rubaya and Everson Chatambudza.
Rubaya, however, objected and applied to bar the State from leading the witness on the basis that there was a ruling that was made and was still in force barring the prosecutor from summoning the judge to testify.
He also argued that the State never served them with a statement to show that Chirawu-Mugomba will be called as a witness.
Rubawa further argued that the court cannot hear the said witness since an application of this nature was dismissed before the court.
Chirenje submitted that Kombo and Kasi will suffer no prejudice if the witness is put on the stand, as they introduced the letter in question as evidence.
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The prosecutor filed the application arguing that Kombo and Kasi, through their lawyers, consistently referred to a letter which was allegedly authored by the Council for Legal Education chairperson who happens to be Chirawu-Mugomba.
“It is accepted as a matter of fact that prior to commencement of the trial the letter allegedly written by the judge was not among the documents and evidence discovered to the accused persons through counsel by the State,” Chirenje said.
“The State now seeks to call the alleged author, which is in no way a technique by the State to introduce new aspects which the accused persons may not have foreseen or been prepared for before trial,” he said.
