Maravi

Sata calls for changes to judges' retirement age

Sata calls for changes to judges' retirement age
By Amos Malupenga
Monday April 21, 2008 [04:00]

PATRIOTIC Front president Michael Sata has called for the amendment of the law to do away with age restriction for Supreme Court judges if they are to truly act independently. Announcing his decision to withdraw his appeal before the Supreme Court in the matter where he is accused of defaming President Levy Mwanawasa, Sata said he saw no reason to continue with the appeal when a lower court has insisted on proceeding with trial. He said it would be a mockery of justice to continue with the appeal.

Sata had asked the High Court to quash the indictment against him for allegedly being defective and also called on the court to look at the constitutional issues surrounding the matter.

But the High Court threw out Sata's application for lack of merit and ordered his quick trial. However, Sata appealed before a single judge of the Supreme Court who also dismissed the appeal.Later, Sata allegedly appealed before the full bench of the Supreme Court.

When the matter came up before principal resident magistrate Kafunda, Sata's lawyers - who included former attorney general Bonaventure Mutale - argued that the magistrate's court could not continue with the matter because there was an appeal before the Supreme Court.

But magistrate Kafunda, in his ruling, dismissed this application saying Sata's lawyers did not show evidence that there was an appeal before the Supreme Court because what was there was only a notice to appeal without, even, grounds of appeal.

Magistrate Kafunda said it was regrettable that senior lawyers like Mutale who is even state counsel could mislead the court.

On the other hand, Sata has insisted there was an appeal before the Supreme Court arguing that there was no way a former attorney general could mislead the court.

He said in an interview that while it was true that the Judiciary was a mirror of justice, justice is never delivered when the mirror is darkened. "When there are so many impediments, the mirror of justice is darkened and fails to give that justice," Sata said.

He said there was need to change the law by removing age restriction, which seems to be putting most judges in a crisis of uncertainty.

Sata said before independence, Zambia faced a crisis of expectation, which affected all blacks, and a crisis of uncertainty, which was not as serious as the first one because the Judiciary, the defence and security were not in the hands of blacks.

Sata said there was need to look at constitutional amendments that did not only cement the desires of politicians.

"Today, we don't need age limit for judges of the Supreme Court so that they don't suffer from uncertainty," he said. "The majority of judges in our Supreme Court have reached that age the retirement age of 65.

Unless they play ball with the appointing authority, they will not get that contract to extend their stay on the bench. In this way, we don't expect judges to be impartial. And without impartiality from the Judiciary, you can as well forget about good governance. So if we can't do away with age restriction, let us increase it from the current 65 to 75 as the retiring age so that our judges do not suffer from a crisis of uncertainty.

These people have nothing else to do after retiring especially that the same law restricting their age does not allow them to practice after leaving the bench. So they have to play ball with the appointing authority or else they will not get that contract extended."

Labels: JUDICIARY, SATA

posted by MrK @ 4:29 AM