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AT 814 pages, this critically important constitutional court decision was never going to be easy to digest. Five judges, headed by the deputy chief justice, Alfonse Chigamoy Owiny-Dollo, contributed to its length and they all had a lot to say.
OF all the many pre-election cases heard by Zimbabwe’s courts, only one resulted in a judicial decision that broadened and protected democracy. And even in this case, the outcome was overturned on appeal.
The stand-out case was heard by Judge Joseph Martin Mafusire. In Amalgamated Rural Teachers Union of Zimbabwe v Zanu-PF he was asked for an interim order to prevent school pupils, teachers, school buses and buildings from being used as though they were resources belonging to the ruling party.
On 31 July – 1 August , the JIFA team, consisting of Dame Linda Dobbs and Amy Sinclair, conducted legal researcher training for a group 11 students.
FOR most participants at the core judicial skills week just ended at the University of Cape Town, the idea of an “integrity branch” of government was a novel one. It was briefly introduced to the gathering of judges from across the continent by UCT law professor Hugh Corder. Over the years, his regular discussions with judges at courses run by the Judicial Institute for Africa have been peppered with challenging new concepts, and this time was no exception.
Corder said that academics and judges in a number of countries were debating whether the time had come to broaden our understanding of government and add another branch to the long-established view that there were “three arms”: the executive, the legislature and the judiciary.
Speaking to Jifa after his presentation, Corder said he believed the idea of an “integrity branch” held great potential. He had been part of the drafting of SA’s post-apartheid constitutions, and all those involved in the processes “were very aware of the democratic deficit” – this a reference to the problem that for most people democracy is something experienced only at election time.