Junior magistrates accused of bullying

Isaiah Morewagae | Wednesday February 5, 2014 16:04

 

“On the issue of relations between the bench and the bar, LSB seeks to emphasise that respect between these parties is critical for delivery of justice and perceptions relating to the same,” Lecha said. Lecha noted that last year they witnessed some magistrates especially junior ones, bullying legal practitioners, litigants and members of the public. He stressed that the media has on a number of occasions reported on the harassment and even detention of members of the public by magistrates.

He said these magistrates have developed a tendency of issuing warrants of arrest willy-nilly against legal practitioners, prosecutors, witnesses and even innocent members of the public who visit court.

“I stand here today as a victim of such warrants of arrest and on two occasion for that matter. In one instance a warrant of arrest was issued against my person by a junior magistrate because I, in my capacity as the Chairman of LSB, had to attend a crucial meeting with the Honourable Chief justice and requested to be excused from this magistrates court for the meeting but was nonetheless issued,” Lecha said.

These junior magistrates, Lecha said, set dates of hearing and do not show up in court on the day of the trial or at times come hours late and do not even proffer any excuse or apology.  “This behaviour I alluded to above shows in large measure that these junior magistrate who behave in such a manner lack the requisite character traits of a judicial officer. This is but one more reason why appointment of judicial officers especially High Court judges should be done in a transparent manner in order to avoid those with known deficient character traits ending up on the bench,” Lecha said.

Lecha also sought answers from the Chief Justice Maruping Dibotelo on the issue of forum shopping. He said during previous engagements there had been no indication that the concern of forum shopping was linked to bribery of judges and registry staff by legal practitioners but was more to the ineffectiveness of some of the judges. To date he added, no evidence has been provided to back the suggestion of bribery.

“Indeed his lordship the Chief Justice has retracted the allegation as made with respect to the judges, the same should be apply with legal practitioners, otherwise who are the practitioners bribing,” Lecha asked. He stressed that LSB is concerned that while there is discussions on forum shopping and the pointing of fingers at legal practitioners and by extension public litigants, there is little mention of perceptions of forum shopping in matters where government is a litigant.

“Care needs to be taken that all measures that are being undertaken to enhance transparency at the High Court such as electronic allocation of cases should similarly be employed at the Court of Appeal as this is the last point where a litigant gets closure of his matter,” Lecha said.