Presidential Powers (Temporary Measures) (Extension of State Liabilities Act to the Assets of Ruwa Local Board) Regulations

Using the Presidential Powers (Temporary Measures) Act, the President has applied the State Liabilities Act [Chapter 22:13] — the statute that protects State property from ordinary execution — to legal proceedings against Ruwa Local Board.

The immediate effect is that all Ruwa Local Board assets attached, or threatened with attachment and sale in execution, under High Court order HC 5365/22 are released from attachment and revert to or stay in the council's possession for as long as these regulations last. The protection is expressly retrospective: it covers proceedings commenced or completed before the regulations began.

The preamble explains the reasoning. The High Court had ordered on 18 June 2024 that a sale in execution of the council's movable assets proceed without delay. The attached equipment included refuse compactors, graders, a honey sucker, motor vehicles and sewer pumps. Government argued that losing them risked uncollected refuse, sewer blockages and burst water pipes, exposing an estimated 300 000 residents to dysentery, typhoid and cholera.

For the judgment creditor, the practical result is that the writ cannot be executed against these assets while the regulations stand. The regulations do not cancel the underlying debt or the judgment; they remove the execution remedy against council property and route the creditor to the State Liabilities Act procedure instead.

Regulations made under the Presidential Powers (Temporary Measures) Act are temporary by design — they lapse after six months unless replaced by an Act — but this instrument does not print its own commencement or expiry date. It was gazetted on 18 October 2024.