CITIBANK CEO TOGETHER WITH HER LAWYER BROTHER CONTINUE TO EXTEND LEGAL BATTLE WITH EX-EMPLOYEE WITH MORE LEGAL COSTS TO THE BANK
It has emerged that Citibank CEO Lowani Chibesakunda has engaged her brother’s law firm Chibesakunda & Company to defend a protracted legal suit in which the bank was sued by a former employee in 2013.
A matter that relates to a Labour dispute commenced by Suhayl Dudhia in 2013 should ordinarily not take this long to dispose of but Citibank has decided to drag it on to challenge even the smallest of orders at a huge legal cost.
In 2013, Dudhia took Citibank to the Industrial Relations Court on an employment dispute where the court ruled in his favour and ordered that he be paid 38 months of his salary as damages.
Citibank, being dissatisfied with this ruling, appealed in the Court of Appeal, where the court followed a recent precedent and held that since the matter took over 12 months, it should go back to the High Court for retrial.
However, the bank appealed to the Supreme Court. The Chief Justice, leading the Supreme Court bench, in a landmark ruling that has been applauded by the entire legal community, overruled the detested Court of Appeal precedent, known infamously as the Guardall Ruling (Guardall Security Group Limited vs Reinford Kabwe CAZ Appeal No. 44/2019), and dismissing Citibank’s appeal, thereby upholding the High Court judgment of the former employee with Citibank.
After the final Supreme Court ruling , Chibesakunda tried to obtain a stay for Citibank from the High Court of Zambia, which stay was refused by the High Court Judge who in his ruling said that:
“the very confusion in the state of the many avenues being created by the Respondent [Citibank], in what appears to be its attempt at all costs, to keep this case alive, makes this application irrelevant…
It seems the Respondent [Citibank] has an intelligent and innovative initiative of keeping this cause alive. There cannot be litigation in perpetuity. Matters must surely come to an end one way or another.”
Following the latest order, a writ of fieri facias (FIFA) was issued against Citibank, allowing court bailiffs to seize the bank’s property so that damages owed to Dudhia could be paid.
The bailiffs entered Citibank last Thursday afternoon to execute the latest judgment against the bank. However, before they could complete the seizure, the Bank in a last ditch effort obtained yet another ex-parte stay before the Court of Appeal despite the ruling from the High Court judge that lower courts should not seek to stay a Supreme Court decision.
It seems Citibank is resolved to continue to try and evade settlement of the judgment sum which only amounts to K2.6 million against the millions of kwachas being used to pay the CEO’s brother’s law firm as legal fees.
The matter could have been resolved within a shorter time at a much lower cost to the bank, but the bank has instead chosen to incur more legal fees and interest costs to the bank.
SOURCE: Zambia Reports