State lawyers, comprising Principal State Attorneys Vicent Tango, George Mandepo and Alecia Mbuya as well as State Attorney Erign Rumisha, told the High Court panel comprising Judges Issa Maige, Stephen Magoiga and Seif Kulita that the petition is unmaintainable in law.
They submitted that Mr Kaunda, who is the petitioner, has no locus standi to present the petition as there were no rights involving him that had been violated under the constitution to warrant the court to intervene in the matter.
According to the lawyers, the court has not been clothed with jurisdiction to entertain the petition and subsequently grant the reliefs sought as per provisions of Article 100 (1) of Constitution of the United Republic of Tanzania and Section 3 of the Parliamentary Immunities, Powers and Privileges Act.
The present petition, according to the state attorneys, was incompetent and bad in law for contravening the provisions of section 1 (2), 3, 4, 6 (d) and 8 (1) (b) of the Basic Rights and Duties Enforcement Act and Article 26 (2) of the Constitution.
On the questions of frivolous, vexatious and unjustifiable, the defence lawyers responded that the constitution spells out, in particular under Article 7, what matters that one cannot demand from the court, but the rest could be claimed and granted after going into the merits of the dispute involved.
