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Johnsias Mutonhori, Correspondent
THE Judicial Service Commission (JSC) has introduced the Integrated Electronic Case Management System (IECEMS) in Gweru, a system which allows people to access courts virtually.
The development comes with a number of positives for the litigating public as they will attend courts at no cost, ease corruption as well as facilitate the expeditious hearing of court cases.
The virtual court is expected to start operating on 1 February this year, allowing legal practitioners and members of the public to access both the labour and administrative courts.
The system will also promote convenient and real time access to justice from any party of the country as well as addressing challenges associated with manual operation of the justice system.
In a bid to fight corruption within the judiciary, the system will have all documents and files saved in a web-based system and virtual server backups will shut down room for tampering with manually filed documents.
Plans are also afoot for the full integration of IECEMS with other key stakeholder organisations such as Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP), Zimbabwe Prisons and Correctional Services (ZPCS), Law Society of Zimbabwe (LSZ), Attorney General’s Office (AG), National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) Legal Aid Directorate (LAD) and Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Court (Zacc).
Addressing legal practitioners and members of the Press in Gweru, JSC Secretary Mr Walter Chikwanha said digitalisation of the courts was a first of its kind in Zimbabwe and the launch of Phase 3 would affect virtual systems.
“We are moving into Phase 2 and we have targeted the Labour Court and then we will move into Phase 3 targeting the general division of the High Court and the office of the Sheriff. So, we are advising legal practitioners that they will not be able to litigate in those three courts manually from 1 February as they are required to familiarise themselves with the IECEMS system.
“The digitalisation of the courts is a new thing that we are introducing in Zimbabwe. It is the enhancement of access to justice and it will ensure that people are able to access a court from wherever,” said Mr Chikwanha.
He added that the system would help in easing access to justice and assist in curbing any anomalies.
“With IECEMS you can never miss a document or a file because they are in soft copy. If you make attempts to delete something we have back-up systems of the file that are readily available. We have been told of bogus lawyers, now a bogus lawyer cannot file or litigate if they are not in the system.”
Gweru lawyer Mr Esau Mandipa said this was a good development which was cost and time effective and allowing for a wider reach.
“The introduction of the virtual courts is a good development especially for the courts. It is cost effective and not time consuming. One no longer needs to travel from one place to another to have their hearing unless where specially necessary,” he said.
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