We’re not an assembly of saints, we’ve sent out some corrupt officers – Judiciary

WE are not an assembly of saints, a few people have tried to go off the rail, says Chief Registrar and Director of Court Operations Exnobert Zulu.

And Zulu says there have been suggestions that the Chief Justice should also be allowed to sit on the Constitutional Court, but says that is subject to constitutional reforms.

Meanwhile, Zulu says there is a positive delay in some cases to allow the parties involved to reconcile.

Speaking when he featured on ZNBC’s Sunday Interview, Zulu said some judicial officers have actually admitted to receiving bribes and have been fired.

“The issues of corruption like I said, we are not an assembly of saints, we do have a few people that tried to go off the rail. One of the challenges I have found is that people allege corruption, sometimes when you ask them [that] are you willing to face the person that is corrupt to give us evidence that we should be able to deal with this matter, others will say ‘no I don’t want to be the one that is causing him to lose the job’. It becomes difficult. But there are other good citizens that have gone ahead and said ‘yes I am’,’’ he said.

“We have called other people in the office, some will testify, then and there [we] ask ‘this person has brought a complaint, this is what they are saying, is it true’? Two or three times people have admitted. How much did you get from this person, ‘2,500’, where is the money? ‘It is there’, okay go and get it and give them back. We take the matter and refer it for disciplinary hearing, some of them have been escorted out of the Judiciary. These are things that happened not too long ago, a few months ago’’.

Zulu said one of the challenges the Judiciary faced was that some people who made corruption claims were not willing to substantiate them.

“So we have taken a zero tolerance towards corruption. The difficulty that we are going to have is where allegations are made but people are not willing to come and substantiate their allegations. So they will send in anonymously. If they specifically indicate that they are whistle-blowers, they don’t want their names to be identified, for instance, then we will be able to engage [the] Anti Corruption Commission to be able to take up the matter. Sometimes we have noticed that people allege corruption because they don’t understand the system. So what we do in that particular instance where we have established that this person has a complaint but the complaint is born out of by their lack of understanding of the system, we have referred the matter to the Legal Aid Board,’’ he said.

“So corruption if we can be helped by people giving us evidence, we will able to deal with it. Also if our people can help us by not offering these particular bribes to people, [with an] understanding that it is only when we act right that we will have an institution that serves us all. Desperation should not lead you to doing wrong’’.

Asked whether the Judiciary was open to criticism looking at the contempt of court cases against people who tried to criticise certain decisions, Zulu said contempt of court was there to preserve the dignity and integrity of the judicial process.

“There is a popular saying by one of the justices of the House of Lords who said ‘Justice is not a clustered virtue, she must be allowed to suffer scrutiny and respectful though outspoken’. What that means is that people should be allowed to criticise the decisions but then there is a catch, it must be respectful. Why is it important to be respectful? Remember that you and I are in this transient position. ZNBC, the Judiciary was there before we came in. We have a duty to hand over to the next generation an institution that the people will be able to respect. Contempt of court is there to preserve the dignity and integrity of the judicial process. It is not there to protect the image of the individual judge or individual adjudicator. It is there to protect the process,’’ Zulu said.

“Remember that the Judiciary only stands if it commands a respect of the people and instills or retains the faith of the people. Where people lose trust, where people lose faith in the Judiciary, the Judiciary cannot do anything. So contempt proceedings are meant to preserve the dignity but then they are not without scrutiny’’.

Further asked about supervisory challenges with the Chief Justice sitting on the Supreme Court and not the Constitutional Court, Zulu said there have been suggestions that the Chief Justice should also be allowed to sit on the Constitutional Court but that was subject to constitutional reforms.

“That is an issue that has been discussed in a number of foras. I think the last one that I attended was where I think the Chief Justice was having a meeting with Judges of the Constitutional Court, that was noted. I think there were suggestions that probably both the Chief Justice and Deputy Chief Justice should be allowed to sit on that particular court. It will make it easy for them to understand the processes because it is a collegiate court. It should be able to have input on the decisions that are going to come out of the Judiciary. But again we are susceptive to the will of the people, what we have now is what the people gave us. So we have to wait for constitutional reforms. We are hoping with the challenges experienced or with the positives experienced, we will be able to come up with a system that is going to work with all of us. So it is work in progress,’’ Zulu said.

Meanwhile, Zulu said there was a positive delay in some cases to help the parties involved to reconcile.

“It will be good to accept that there is a measure of delay in these particular matters. If you maybe allow me, I think there are two kinds of delay. There is a positive delay and there is an inordinate delay. Positive delay, there are times that you come to court, I have seen this in matters dealing with families, issues of property settlements, issues of child custody and divorce. You come to court, the court will look at the matter, parties appear before court and if the Judge deserts or a Magistrate deserts that, what is operating here is anger,’’ said Zulu.

“Sometimes they will desert and say ‘okay look, can we adjourn this matter to give an opportunity to deal with this particular matter outside court’? Sometimes they might deny but sometimes the courts insist ‘okay fine let us adjourn the matter for two, three months’. In most instances you find that by the time the parties are coming back, they will come and say ‘we are withdrawing the matter’, why are you withdrawing it? They say ‘we have reconciled, there is no problem anymore’. That is a positive delay. So someone will be looking at the record that the matter has delayed but ultimately justice has been served. Because the matter has been withdrawn, you will not credit the Judge who deserts at the beginning that they needed to give these people an opportunity to build capacity for them to resolve their issues’’.