Maravi

Judges judging themselves

Judges judging themselves
By The Post
Sat 26 May 2012, 13:00 CAT

IF you are honest, truly honest, you won't be corrupted. If you are unassuming and have a clear understanding of the worth of people and of yourself, you won't be corrupted. And it is very important to maintain eternal vigilance about this throughout one's life and be very self-critical. It is also very important to always examine everything one has done, checking to see whether it was correct or not, whether or not one let oneself be carried away, whether or not pride had anything to do with it.

It is said that absolute power corrupts absolutely. And for this reason, the exercise of power must be the constant practice of self-limitation and modesty.

Looking at what has happened over the last few weeks with our Judiciary and some of our judges, soon people will know everything about what happened: what we did and what our adversaries did, what goals we sought and what goals our adversaries sought, and who was right - we or the judges who were conniving, abusing the judicial system to find us wanting and humiliate us, who had acted dishonestly in discharging a public trust, who had abandoned their oath and who were serving the interests of corruption and abuse.

We challenged them, absolutely convinced that the justice, ideas we were seeking, defending would triumph in our homeland someday - a conviction we will always hold, that humanity's legitimate causes will always advance and triumph eventually.

Our adversaries mobilised all sorts of disgruntled elements to speak for them. They were not short of propaganda against us. All sorts of lies have been told against us. They have tried very hard to spread all sorts of disinformation.

Today, they can even take the prize in lies and calumny. They went even to tell lies that Fred M'membe and judge Albert Wood went to the same school - St John's Secondary School in Mongu. Yes, Fred attended school at St John's and did his Form I to Form III there and then moved on to St Francis Secondary School, Malole, Kasama.

Even at University of Zambia, the two never met in the same school. They were there at different times and in different places. But this is the lie that some of these judges are peddling against judge Wood and us.

This was the reason they themselves stated for removing judge Wood from that case, claiming he was a friend of Fred. But the same judges have commenced judicial review proceedings and have even obtained a stay from their own friends, their own workmates.

And they want the complaints against them to be decided upon by their own friends and workmates. When Sebastian Zulu, our Minister of Justice, calls this anarchy, they want to accuse him of being unprofessional and unrespectful of the court! This is truly anarchy.

This is truly selfishness, greed and vanity. This is truly lack of respect for others and for themselves. If they had a sense of shame, they wouldn't be doing the things they are doing and they wouldn't have done the things they have done.

It is clear the Judiciary has been turned into a kangaroo court where judges can connive and handle matters in a manner that suits them. There is justice for themselves and none for others. We did not choose to appear before judge Wood. It is they themselves who allocated the matter to judge Wood. We didn't take the matter to court.

It is us who were taken to court. We have no problems whatsoever with the merits or demerits of the case. What we have a problem with is their conduct, their collusion to defeat the course of justice and fix us. And if one reads their judgments, it is not difficult to discern their malice and ill-will. And it is this that motivated their criminal acts against us.

We know that these judges will get the judgments they want from their own Judiciary, their own friends, their own workmates. It is a league. And at the helm of this league are their friends.

It's a cartel. And they are there to protect their own interests and those of their friends. We know what is going on; everybody knows what they are doing. They have joined hands with the opposition and the media run by ex-convicts who have issues with us, politically and otherwise.

They have been feeding into these elements. And today they have the audacity to accuse others of talking about matters that are in court! What type of double standards are these? You cannot call others to virtues which you yourselves do not make an effort to practice.

Batila mwikala patalala mwine apatalalika. They started this problem they themselves. We peacefully and respectfully asked them to try and address their own problems. Their responses were full of lies, contradictions and arrogance. They saw themselves as being the alpha and the omega as far as this case was concerned.

They acted arrogantly and without care because they saw no other way for us to deal with their injustices against us. They thought wherever we turn, we will find them or their friends to sort us out. If we appeal to the Supreme Court, their friends will be there to take care of things. If we go to the Judicial Commission, their friends are there.

In fact, in one of their letters to us, they said there is nothing that we can do. But what they forgot is that when one door is closed, many more are open. That's why they could not take it when a complaint was launched with the Ministry of Justice and eventually the President appointed a tribunal to investigate our complaint against them.

They have been talking, they have been bragging and we were just listening and watching them because ubuchenjeshi bwa nkoko pungwa tasakamana. Today they are even bragging that they are back to work and the matter is going nowhere, it was just a small confusion that they have cleared.

Cleared! How? They are joking. If they think they are the ultimate powers in this country, then they have got it wrong because real power does not lie with them. It lies, and will always lie, with the people.

If they think because they control the Judiciary, then they will use it to defend themselves even when they are wrong, what will they say if others also use what they have to defend themselves? If this becomes the order of the day and the way to resolve disputes, what will remain of this country?

This will be a destruction of the authority of the state. If you destroy the authority of the state, the consequences are terrible. They may not intend to do so but this will be the final result of the scheme they have embarked on. And they are making enormous mistakes by failing to foresee the consequences of what they are doing and by not doing the right thing to reach the goals and purposes they are proclaiming.

What they are doing is unleashing a lot of negative tendencies, and opportunistic elements are in the process being introduced to destroy a lot of things. They have made enormous mistakes and have unleashed a process that will be self-destructive for themselves and for their league.

Labels: JUDICIARY

posted by MrK @ 7:15 PM