High Court poised to pass ruling on Ponda case today

The High Court Dar es Salaam zone will today deliver a ruling on the protracted case against the outspoken Muslim cleric Sheikh Ponda Issa Ponda.

It will rule on the preliminary objection filed by the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) against Ponda’s application for a review of an offence he was found guilty of last year; disobeying a lawful order issued by the Kisutu Resident Magistrate’s Court.

This comes after the earlier filed preliminary objection by the DPP against Sheikh Ponda claiming that the clerk’s application was not valid.  

Ponda, who is the Secretary of the Council of Islamic Organisations in Tanzania, filed the application seeking a review of the Morogoro Resident Magistrate’s decision which had turned down his request to withdraw the sedition charges against him.

The DPP objected to the application on the grounds that it was contrary to section 372(2) of the Criminal Procedure Act (CPA).

According to the DPP, the Act restricts a person from appealing or seeking a review of a decision in an on-going criminal case.

 Responding to the DPP’s objection, Ponda’s advocate Juma Nassor asked the court to strike off the objection maintaining that the Act did not prohibit the said appeal and that they were not the first people to do so.

 “We ask the court to hear the application in order to allow justice be done,” he pleaded and today the court will pass a ruling on that plea.

In November last year, Sheikh Ponda lodged the application at the High Court sekeking a revision of the lower court’s decision to refuse withdrawing the sedition charge against him.

 Sheikh Ponda was arraigned in the Morogoro court on August 19, last year, facing charges of disobeying a lawful order to abstain from incitement to commit offences.

 The prosecution alleged that the accused committed the offence on August 10, last year, at Ndege Primary School grounds in Morogoro municipality.

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN