The Supreme Court has ruled that pregnant students and their lovers cannot be expelled from college.

The court was dealing with the case of the pregnancy of a married student at Morgenster Teachers' Training College in Masvingo.

Morgenster is a private college run by the Reformed Church of Zimbabwe.

The Supreme Court said that expelling the students was contrary to public policy.

Five Supreme Court judges said while the regulation might not be ultra vires Section 23 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe, which provides for protection from discrimination, it ought to be struck down on the ground that it is contrary to public policy.

Clause No 7(a), of a contract signed by students on enrolment with the college reads: "I understand that I will be withdrawn from the course when I fall pregnant or am involved in causing the pregnancy of another student or pupil."

In a ruling, made available on Monday, Judge Nicholas McNally declared the clause "contrary to public policy and therefore null and void". Chief Justice Godfrey Chidyausiku, and Justices Simbarashe Muchechetere, Vernanda Ziyambi and Luke Malaba, were in agreement.

The court made the ruling in the appeal by Lloyd Chaduka, the principal of the college, and the college itself, against a High Court decision in favour of Enita Mandizvidza, a third and final-year teacher training student.

The High Court had declared the clause unconstitutional.

This was after Chaduka forced Mandizvidza to sign a withdrawal letter at his office on 9 July 1999, when she fell pregnant following her marriage in 1998.

Chaduka and the college, represented by Advocate Pearson Nherere, had argued that Mandizvidza entered into a contract with the college and had voluntarily withdrawn from the college.

Nherere, while admitting that the regulation was discriminatory, said Section 23 referred to discrimination by a public authority thereby providing an escape clause for his clients, a private institution, on the basis that the law of contract was a matter of personal law.

But, McNally said: "No court should therefore shrink from the duty of declaring a contract contrary to public policy when the occasion so demands.

"The power to declare contracts contrary to public policy should, however, be exercised sparingly and only in the clearest of cases."

The clause as worded is far wider than would be necessary if it related strictly to morality, he said.

"It punishes the married woman who falls pregnant. It does not punish the male student who has extra-marital sex with a non-student, even if she becomes pregnant as a consequence.

"It cannot thus be defended on the grounds that a religious organisation is entitled to insist on certain moral standards among its students."

Tendai Biti represented Mandizvidza.