Andrew
The Office of Master of the High Court recently held a two-day team-building workshop in Harare to relaunch the office, which is now under the Ministry of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs.
Previously, the office was under the Judicial Service Commission (JSC).
The Sunday Mail Senior Reporter RICHARD MUPONDE (RM) engaged Master of the High Court, Mr Eldard Mutasa (EM), on a range of issues, including the office’s operations, corruption and its transfer to the Ministry of Justice.
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RM: Can you outline the purpose of the recently held workshop?
EM: The workshop was aimed at enhancing and capacitating officers of the Office of Master of the High Court so that they appreciate the vision of the office, its mission and core values.
This is the first workshop since the transfer of the Office of Master of the High Court from the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) to the Ministry of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs on November 26 last year through a Cabinet resolution.
RM: What motivated the need to transfer the office?
EM: This office has been identified as critical because it is at the centre of facilitating the turnaround of companies under distress.
Running any business is like a gamble: It can be successful and it can also face challenges.
But the New Dispensation has said it wants to focus on saving and creating jobs, and this can only happen when companies don’t collapse.
So the corporate rescue plan was recommended as opposed to judicial management, which was there pre-2018.
There was judicial management of companies, which focused on the resuscitation of companies, but the laws were not well-crafted to facilitate that.
Now, with the new Insolvency Act, which is providing for corporate rescue or business rescue, distressed companies can enjoy some relief from creditors as they look for money.
RM: Does the transfer mean the office is now autonomous?
EM: You could deduce that from what Justice (Legal and Parliamentary Affairs) Permanent Secretary Mrs Virginia Mabhiza said in her keynote address during the workshop.
Government is supporting the independence of the office as a policy.
We are also working closely with our parent ministry to facilitate decentralisation and expansion of the Master’s Office.
RM: In line with Government’s devolution agenda, can you outline your plans to decentralise the office going forward?
EM: Through decentralisation, we are looking at increasing or improving access to justice.
Currently, the Master’s Office is found in five provinces – Harare, Manicaland, Mashonaland West, Masvingo and Bulawayo.
If you look at it, we are into deceased estates’ administration, and death happens in every province, so our offices are required there.
We also have companies in all provinces. We have another division that deals with companies, so if we are found in every province, it will be convenient for clients.
Operations of the Master’s Office will be at everyone’s doorstep if we are found in districts and provinces.
So, the office must be conveniently located for everyone.
We need to be accessible to deal with disputes that have to do with estates of the deceased.
RM: Can you outline the type of cases you have been dealing with this year?
EM: The bulk of our work this year has centred on dispute resolution.
These disputes arise from greed on the part of some potential beneficiaries of an estate.
In some cases, it can be uncles or aunties who are not direct beneficiaries of the estate.
In most cases, they want to use their positions of influence in families to grab whatever would have been left behind by the deceased.
We have dealt with about 300 cases of disputes countrywide, where we invite families and discuss areas of conflict.
RM: Is your office capacitated to assist people with disabilities?
EM: We have this mantra where it’s being said we should not leave anyone behind.
So, we do not intend to leave anyone behind as far as access to justice is concerned.
We are looking at capacitation in terms of ramps and breaking language barriers like having sign language interpreters, among other ways of enhancing access to justice.
Also, having the infrastructure in all provinces and every district, but that requires financial support, development of infrastructure and acquisition of assets with assistance from Treasury and so on.
RM: Are there plans to digitise the Office of Master of High Court?
EM: We are part of the digitisation programme under the ministry.
We are also in our own way going to enhance access to the offices through various platforms.
It’s something which is a high priority because we have to have our own website where people can download forms.
Currently, we have our own email address and a corporate email where people can submit papers; it’s all part of the plan.
There is no way we cannot be part of the Integrated Case-Management System because that’s where the world is going.
Had we remained in the JSC, we were going to be integrated in 2023.
All the preparations are ready, the paperwork is there and all that needs to be done is to enhance it at the appropriate time.
Now that we are under the Ministry of Justice, we will be receiving guidance from them and working together so that we can have our digitisation programme, which can then be integrated at the right time.
We want a platform where people can file their papers digitally.
As an office, we are also part of the technical working group on ease of doing business that was formed by the Office of the President and Cabinet in conjunction with the World Bank.
They have several technical working groups and ours is resolving insolvency.
The technical working group is still running.
It is just that the World Bank suspended the rankings because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
It will be unfair to assess economies when we have natural disasters like the Covid-19 pandemic.
But, we are now implementing the insolvency law which came into operation in 2018.
The law promotes business rescue and corporate rescue. The New Dispensation is saying no to the closure of companies, because people lose jobs.
The law says let us be biased towards saving companies from collapse.
So, distressed companies enjoy what we call a moratorium when they are placed under business rescue or corporate rescue.
The moratorium is a period where you are not bothered by creditors.
You are given time to mobilise funds to pay creditors and at the same time capacitate the business.
RM: What are you doing to ensure there is gender equity in your organisation?
EM: I would say 80 percent of our staff are women, and in senior positions it is almost the same.
So we can say there is balance, as long as the balance is in favour of women.
RM: What modalities or policy measures have you put in place to combat corruption?
EM: We have several initiatives that we are going to follow to enhance transparency; that is to say, we are open to scrutiny.
We are free to have the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission at our offices to enhance our prevention measures.
We want to entrench a culture of responsibility, a culture of transparency and a culture of accountability.
So we are simply going to enforce that at every opportunity.
The law is followed regardless of who is before you, whether the person is rich or dangling a carrot.
It should not be a factor to consider; you look at the issue, not the person or what the person is offering.
You should be guided by the law, rules and procedures.
We will be conducting what we call monitoring and evaluation exercises, where we look at standard operating procedures, the law and then the file and compare how you are doing your work versus what is expected.
So, that requires capacitation in human resources so that we go out and do justice.
Anyone who is engaging in any corrupt activity should know that it’s a recipe for losing their job and hopefully via Chikurubi Maximum Prison.
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