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Fidelis Munyoro-Chief Court Reporter
PUBLIC interviews for candidates aspiring to fill 10 vacancies for High Court judges and one for the Administrative Court ended on Wednesday and the Judicial Service Commission panel is now deliberating on the candidates.
A shortlist of 39 candidates were grilled during the three days of interviews. The first two days saw 36 candidates being interviewed for the 10 vacancies on the High Court bench, while the last day was reserved for three candidates vying for the single position at the Administrative Court.
In his closing remarks, Chief Justice Luke Malaba said the commission would now retire to deliberate on the results of the interviews.
“Hopefully, the commission will be able to produce the list required by the Constitution for the President to make the necessary appointments in due course,” he said.
“The commission would like to take this opportunity to thank all members of the public who took part in various ways in the interviews over the period of interview in question.
“It also would like to thank members of the JSC secretariat for having taken all the trouble to make the necessary administrative arrangements and ensuring that these proceedings occurred seamlessly.
“We would also like to thank members of the media who took part in the proceedings to ensure that members of the public in general are fully and correctly informed about what has been taking place. Therefore, from now on, the proceedings that are to follow are confidential and the public interviews proceedings have now, therefore, come to a close.”
Initially, the JSC received 66 nominations for the High Court and nine for the Administrative Court.
Five nominations for the High Court were invalid while one was invalid for the Administrative Court. The 65 remaining candidates sat for aptitude tests last month with 39 qualifying for the public interviews held this week.
Some of the candidates performed well, but were handicapped by allegations of unprofessionalism and chequered social life, while some had a torrid time during the interviews or were clueless.
Some of the candidates who performed well include Advocate Choice Damiso, Adv David Ochieng, Regis Dembure, Faith Mushure, Abednico Ndebele, Arnold Tsunga, Wilbert Mandinde, Naison Chivayo, Clever Tsikwa, Gibson Mandaza, Tamutswa Muzana, Kaitano Sande and Tawanda Katehwe.
The JSC has the constitutional mandate to conduct public interviews for prospective judges about to join the bench.
The Commission will then send a list of recommended interviewees to the President who may assent to the names or ask the JSC to submit a fresh set of names.
According to the Constitution, a person qualifies to be appointed as a Judge of the High Court if he or she is at least 40-years-old and has been a Judge of a court with unlimited jurisdiction in civil or criminal matters in which the common law is Roman-Dutch or English.
The person should also have been qualified to practice as a legal practitioner in Zimbabwe or any country with the same common law as in Zimbabwe for at least 10 years.
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