High court judge sends SoS

Ndola based High Court Judge Fulgence Mwenya Chisanga has called on Government to address challenges the Judiciary, Immigration Department, and Prisons services were facing in Luapula Province.

Justice Chisanga said there was urgent need to address challenges the departments were facing to improve the speedy dispensation of justice in the Province.

The Ndola based High Court Judge was speaking today during the ceremonial opening of the High Court Session for Luapula Province.

Justice Chisanga said the Judiciary still faced a critical shortage of Magistrates with only ten out of the 22 needed in the province as per establishment.

She said the province required magistrates to speed up the dispensation of justice as the few that were there were over loaded with work leading to inevitable delays in the disposal of cases.

Justice Chisanga has also called on relevant authorities to address the problem of transport in the Immigration Department.

She said the Immigration Department was facing transport difficulties as the department had no vehicle in the province.

Justice Chisanga said lack of transport in the department made it difficult for the Immigration Officers to reach remote areas especially Kaputa and Nchelenge which borders the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

She further said this made it impossible to monitor illegal immigrants who sometimes obtained National Registration Cards (NRC).

Justice Chisanga also said the illegal immigrants easily went back to their countries of origin when they committed an offence defeating the course of justice.

She said such loopholes should be effectively sealed by the provision of transport to the Immigration Department.

Meanwhile, Justice Chisanga has expressed concerns on the state of prisons in the province.

She said Mansa, Nchelenge, and Samfya Prisons were still congested adding that the structures were also old.

Justice Chisanga further said most of the prisons continued to face water problems except for Nchelenge, which used tap water.

She called on relevant authorities to quickly address these problems so that inmates stayed in the prisons as humane as possible.

And Justice Chisanga has appealed to respective authorities to address challenges being faced by female inmates.

She said some female inmates have infants who were kept in prisons while others delivered in prisons.

She observed that there was need to provide facilities to cater for such situations.

And Luapula Province Prisons Service Regional Commanding officer, Richard Phiri said there was a total of 745 inmates in the province.

He said Mansa had 225 inmates, Nchelenge prison, 196, Samfya 144, Kawambwa 66, while Mwense had 84 inmates.

Mr. Phiri, who described the overall situation in prisons as calm, however, said the prisons were congested because structures were built a long time ago to cater for only a few people.

He described the state of prisons as dilapidated and appealed for the construction of new prisons.

Mr Phiri also said the shortage of transport and fuel at the provincial prisons department was making it difficult for officers to take accused persons to court.

[ ZANIS ]