Chief Justice accuses Justice Komboni of forum shopping
Goitsemodimo Kaelo | Tuesday April 25, 2023 06:00
In an application made before the Court of Appeal in which the CJ seeks an expeditious hearing of his appeal against Justice Kombone and the execution of orders made by Maripe against him stayed, CJ Rannowane says there was no justification for Komboni to have registered his cases in Maun at the first instance.
CJ Rannowane and Gaborone High Court's Justice Komboni have been engaged in a bitter legal battle following last year’s decision to relocate the latter to the Francistown High Court.
Justice Komboni challenged his relocation by instituting proceedings at the Maun High Court. In his founding affidavit, CJ Rannowane says the persistence of Justice Komboni in having the matter heard at the Maun High Court raises several issues of concern. The CJ says, firstly Komboni is aware that there are only two judges in the Maun High Court division, Justice Maripe and Justice Godfrey Nthomiwa.
As such, the electronic case management used for the allocation of matters would inevitably pick one of the two judges, thus providing certainty as to who would hear the case by contrast to Gaborone or Lobatse divisions where there are over 25 judges who could be picked at random. “Those factors would have been known to Judge Komboni when bringing the application and it can be inferred that this would have influenced his choice of the High Court division,” the Chief Justice says.
Furthermore, CJ Rannowane says it is a well-known fact that Justices Komboni and Maripe are close friends while it is known that Komboni hails from the same region as Nthomiwa, namely the Sebina, Marobela and Nshakashokwe areas, whose vicinity is a radius less than a kilometre. “This in my view was the only explanation for the application to have been instituted in Maun against all reasonable circumstances and logic,” added Rannowane. He continues: “The submission by Judge Komboni that the caseload in Maun was significantly lower than in other divisions and therefore that his applications would be heard quickly is no explanation at all and provides no justification for what appears to be a blatant instance of forum shopping because as an urgent application, the matter would be treated as such by any other judge at any division, provided sufficient reasons were provided for an urgent hearing as required by the rules." CJ Rannowane’s annotations come after Justice Komboni had also accused him (Rannowane) of forum shopping after the CJ attempted to move the case to the Gaborone High Court and appointed Justices Godfrey Radijeng, Tshegofatso Mogomotsi, and Ookeditse Maphakwane to preside over the matter. Justice Komboni had argued that the manner of selection of judges raises eyebrows, is capricious, and is not based on seniority.
He argued that the only conclusion that could be drawn from this selection criterion is that the Chief Justice wanted judges that he trusts to preside over the matter and deliver for him. Meanwhile, CJ Rannowane has also accused Justice Maripe of misbehaving when he presided over a matter he had no jurisdiction over. He argues that Justice Maripe did not have jurisdiction to preside over the interlocutory application over the empanelling of judges and has caused unnecessary overlap of jurisdiction between judges of the High Court. CJ Rannowane’s urgent application was set down for hearing last Friday.