COMPANIES AND ASSOCIATIONS TRUSTEES ACT

Acts 3/1873, 39/1973 (s. 52), 29/1981.

ARRANGEMENT OF SECTIONS

Section

1. Short title.
3. Trustees for the time being of any “company” to be owners of property held in trust without fresh transfer.
4. Office-bearers of any association to be owners in like manner.
5. President may extend provisions of section 4 in certain cases.
6. This Act not to extend to companies managed by any Ordinance or Act.
7. High Court may be requested to appoint new trustees when no other means of supplying vacancy exists.
8. In such cases court may appoint trustees and regulate future appointments.
9. Mode in which trustees may be appointed to unincorporated societies.
10. Trustees appointed undersections 8 and 9 to be owners of property as in sections 3 and 4.

AN ACT to remove doubts as to the ownership of immovable property held in trust for unincorporated joint-stock companies and other bodies, and for the appointment, when necessary, of trustees for such companies or bodies.

[Date of commencement: 10th June, 1891.]

1    Short title

This Act may be cited as the Companies and Associations Trustees Act [Chapter 24:04].

2    Interpretation In this Act—

“association” includes any congregation, society or denomination, Christian or otherwise, united for the public worship of Almighty God, as also any missionary society or other agency engaged in promoting the spread of religion and civilization; and any school for the education of the poor, any hospital for the relief of the sick, any library and any museum, which school, hospital, library or museum is supported wholly or in part by subscriptions or donations, and is under the management of a committee or other board periodically chosen by the subscribers or donors; and includes any benefit society, masonic body or other institution, not carrying on any trade or business, and consisting of not fewer than twenty-five members;

“company” includes any company or partnership carrying on any trade or business in Zimbabwe, whereof the capital stock is divided into shares, transferable without express consent of all the shareholders or partners, and any mutual assurance society, and whereof the shareholders or partners consist of not fewer than twenty-five persons;

“office-bearers” in regard to associations for the public worship of Almighty God and missionary societies and other agencies for the spread of Christianity and civilization, includes bishops of Episcopal churches, moderators of Presbyterian churches, ministers of Congregational churches, general superintendents of Wesleyan districts and superintendents of Wesleyan circuits, consistories, elders, deacons and generally all functionaries by whatsoever name called who hold office in any church or denomination, whether Christian or not, or in any missionary society, or who form or act for any other such agency as aforesaid;

“trustee” includes the persons in whom by any trust deed or deed of settlement of any company the property, estate and effects of such company are for the time being vested in trust for such company; and all persons not designated as office-bearers, in whom the property, estate and effects of any association are for the time being vested in trust for such association as also the persons in whom the property, estate or effects belonging to any such school, hospital, library or museum as aforesaid are by the rules and regulations thereof, as agreed upon or established by the subscribers or donors to such school, hospital, library or museum, vested for the purposes thereof.

3    Trustees for the time being of any “company” to be owners of property held in trust without fresh transfer

As often as any immovable property is or has been granted or transferred to the trustees of any company, in their capacity as such trustees, and to the trustees of such company for the time being, the trustees for the time being of such company shall be, and they are hereby declared to be, the owners in their said capacity of such property, as fully and absolutely as if the transfer of such property had been originally made to them, in their said capacity, by their own proper names, and no transfer in the Deeds Registry from any former trustee to any new trustee shall be necessary.