MASERU — Lawyers involved in a money lending court battle on Monday agreed to temporarily suspend the hearing of a case in which 1 273 civil servants are suing B-Blue Financial Services for unlawful interest charges.
The civil servants lodged a court case two weeks ago asking the High Court to declare the loan contracts with B-Blue Financial Services null and void saying the company was overcharging them.
The civil servants say B-Blue charges exorbitant interest charges of up to 65 percent as opposed to the 25 percent stipulated by the law.
The case was supposed to proceed in the High Court on Monday but B-Blue and the civil servants’ lawyers agreed to temporarily suspend hearing the case to enable the Court of Appeal to make a decision of similar cases pending before the court.
B-Blue lawyer Johan Daffue told the Lesotho Times that the case did not proceed because they had agreed to await the Court of Appeal decision on a similar case.
“We have agreed to postpone the case to the 10th of May.
“This is to enable the Court of Appeal to decide on similar cases pending before it (Appeal Court).
“We will proceed on that date basing on how the Appeal Court will have decided on similar cases,” Daffue said.
He was referring to the cases in which three prominent money lending companies have appealed the High Court ruling which declared the contracts they had with civil servants null and void.
The High Court on October 21 last year declared the loan contracts which 157 civil servants had with Afrisure (EEZY Management Services), B-Blue Financial Services and Select Management Services null and void.
The appeal will be heard on April 16.
A similar case in which 1 382 civil servants are suing Select Management Services for unlawful interest charges was postponed to May 10.
The reason for postponement was also to await the Court of Appeal decision on the similar cases pending in the Appeal Court.
