Paul Nyathi|Lawyers representing MDC Alliance leader Nelson Chamisa on Saturday managed to meet the court deadline to file answering affidavits and heads of arguments at the Constitutional Court on the challenge against Emmerson Mnangagwa’s election victory.

The President-elect’s lawyers will also file their final papers on Monday ahead of a sitting of the full nine-judge Constitutional Court bench on Wednesday.

Speaking to journalists after filing the papers, MDC Alliance legal representative Sylvester Hashiti said:

“We have filed our detailed heads of arguments addressing all points of all that they (Mnangagwa’s legal team) raised. We have also filed replying affidavits to reply to what their purported experts have said.”

Zanu-PF Secretary for Legal Affairs Paul Mangwana said they would file their opposing papers on Monday as instructed by the Constitutional Court.

“Our main line of argument is that their application is attempting to substitute votes that were cast through a scientific formula which they are positing. Elections are won and lost on the basis of votes. You don’t determine an electoral output through some scientific formulas. At law we have the best evidence and in this case, the best evidence in this case comes from the ballots.”

Mangwana said they would also argue for the case to be dismissed on a technicality over late submissions, before the merits of the case are heard. He said the MDC-Alliance failed to serve President Mnangagwa on time, something Hashiti disputes.