Grain Milling Employers Association of Zimbabwe v NEC for the Food and Allied Industries and Others

The applicant, an employers' association in the milling industry, was invited by the first respondent (an employment council registered under section 59 of the Labour Act) to attend two meetings scheduled for 11 May 2022: a special council meeting and a shareholders' meeting of the eleventh respondent. The applicant received notices and agendas for both meetings on 28 and 29 April 2022. However, on 11 May 2022, when the applicant arrived at the venue, the first respondent barred it from attending either meeting. Both meetings proceeded in the applicant's absence, and resolutions were passed, including matters relating to proposed amendments to the constitution and share structure. The applicant filed an urgent chamber application on 16 May 2022, seeking to interdict implementation of the resolutions and to declare them null and void. The second and third respondents opposed the application on six preliminary points but did not address the merits.

• Whether the High Court has jurisdiction to hear the matter or whether it should be referred to the Labour Court or Commercial Court
• Whether certain paragraphs of the founding papers were illegible rendering the application defective
• Whether the deponent to the founding affidavit had proper authority to institute proceedings on behalf of the applicant
• Whether the applicant had locus standi to bring the application
• Whether the application was ripe for hearing
• Whether the application met the requirements of urgency

All six preliminary objections (points in limine) were dismissed with costs. The matter was allowed to proceed to the merits.

The binding legal principles established are: (1) The High Court has jurisdiction to hear applications for interdicts and declarators concerning rights to participate in meetings of employment councils and employers' associations, even though such bodies are registered under the Labour Act, where the cause of action is based on exclusion from meetings rather than on provisions of the Labour Act itself. (2) The Labour Court's jurisdiction is limited to matters and remedies specifically provided for in the Labour Act; it cannot grant general remedies like interdicts and declarators that are not statutorily conferred upon it. (3) The determinative factor for jurisdictional allocation is the cause of action, not merely the fact that labour-related entities are involved. (4) An applicant's cause of action arises when it is barred from attending meetings to which it was properly invited, making an application filed five days later sufficiently urgent. (5) Procedural defects such as illegible documents or missing resolutions can be cured by filing supplementary documents with the consent of opposing parties.

The court observed that the third respondent was not candid in raising the preliminary objection about authority to sue, as it knew from prior proceedings (HC 2036/22) that the same deponent had authority to represent the applicant. The court suggested this objection was raised merely to 'create dust on a matter which it knew had no merit at all.' The court also noted that the term 'shareholder' was used loosely in the context of employment councils to refer to councillors or constituent members, rather than in its strict commercial law sense. The court expressed the view that if the applicant had no right to attend the meetings, it would not have been sent the agendas in the first place, and noted that the applicant had historically participated in such meetings and had representatives appointed to committees as recently as January 2022.

This Zimbabwean High Court judgment clarifies the jurisdictional boundaries between the High Court and the Labour Court in Zimbabwe. It establishes that matters concerning rights to participate in meetings of employment councils and employers' associations, even where such bodies are created under labour legislation, fall within the High Court's jurisdiction when the relief sought (interdict and declarator) is not provided for in the Labour Act. The case reinforces that the Labour Court, as a creature of statute, has limited jurisdiction confined to remedies specifically provided in the Labour Act. It also demonstrates the court's pragmatic approach to procedural defects that can be cured, while maintaining that substantive rights of participation in organizational governance are protected by the ordinary courts. The judgment is significant for its analysis of when a cause of action arises from the Labour Act versus when labour-related entities are merely incidental to a broader civil rights dispute.