The high legal costs associated with protracted litigation can be a deterrent to bringing or defending legal matters even where there is a good chance of succeeding. In this short article, the writer reviews the recent amendments promulgated on the 30^th of April 2021, which seek to amend the High Court (Fees) (Civil Cases) (Amendment) Rules, published in Statutory Instrument 221 of 2020 (SI 221 of 2020).

In terms of section 57 of the High Court Act [Chapter 7:06], the Minister of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs is empowered to make regulations providing for the fees which shall be payable to the High Court. One such regulation is the High Court (Fees) (Civil Cases) Rules, 1992.

Sometime in September 2020, the Minister made an amendment to the SI 221 of 2020. Although this was done for the fees to remain economically relevant, this did not minimize costs involved in instituting legal proceedings by way of summons were the claim was sounding in money.

Litigation in Zimbabwe is mostly driven by private concerns, and what it meant for litigants instituting legal proceedings by way of filing summons was that, they were required to pay 0.01% of the total claimed amount. To put it in simple terms, where the Plaintiff was claiming ZWL$1,000,000.00 in his/her summons, he/she was required to pay 0.01 of the claimed amount which was ZWL$10,000.00 as High court fees for filing the summons.

The effects of the recent amendments in the High Court (Fees) (Civil Cases) (Amendment) Rules, 2021, as published in SI 106 of 2021 are that litigants are now required to only pay 0.001% of the claimed amount in the summons. To put it in context, using the above example what this now entail is that the Plaintiff who was claiming ZWL$ 1,000,000.00 is obligated to pay ZWL$ 1,000.00 as 0.001 of the claimed amount.

In essence, the amendment in SI 106 of 2021 must be welcomed from a financial standpoint as the costs of instituting legal proceedings by way of summons with a claim sounding in money have been reduced.