A Kabwe clergyman has called for the modernisation of court attire and transformation of the courts into user friendly institutions in the dispensation of justice.
Bishop Davies Malulu of the New Covenant Church said it was high time the country changed the way its judges dress up in dispensing justice.
He told the Justice Frederick Chomba led Legal and Justice Sector Reform Commission sitting in Kabwe that there was need to abandon the dress code inherited from colonial masters and instead come up with one reflecting the Zambian identity and character.
Bishop Malulu caused laughter in the fairly packed conference room at the provincial administration offices in Kabwe when he said ordinary Zambians were intimidated by the wigs that judges put on in court.
The bishop said he could not understand any justification as to why 50 years after political independence, Zambia should still cling to the colonial dress code legacy.
He said time had come to improve on the way judges dress up for work.
The clergyman has also called for transformation of the legal system in order for the general public to easily relate to it and have a sense of belonging.
Bishop Malulu regretted that certain magistrates, justices and judges behave ‘like small gods’ and abuse power in the dispensation of justice when they continuously adjourn cases without advancing reasons especially that the litigants pray to them as the lords of the courts of law.
He said there should be a way that citizens can question the legal system by making it user friendly.
And 59-year-old Evaristo Mwenya also caused laughter when he petitioned that the language used in court intimidates and confuses ordinary citizens when they go to seek for justice.
Mr. Mwenya charged that the English language used in court was difficult to understand and thus disadvantages ordinary citizens.
He charged that the judicial system in Zambia favours the rich adding that the poor people will continue to fail to access fair justice.
Mr. Mwenya has since called on the court system to appoint legal representation for the poor and disadvantaged people that were unable to afford hiring a lawyer.
He said it was only prudent that the court strives to ensure that there was fairness in the adjudication process.
#prayforzambia
May Zambians be liberated from third world mentality. We need intelligent law people not wig wearing knuckleheads.
Am with you my princess
How many times have said this????
Surprisingly, lawyers themselves want to perpetuate this persona of the oppressor in the courts of law. Bukacha lilali?
In true spirit of independence from the British one does not see the head attire on judges in the USA
I am jut disgusted looking at those old looking people in strange wigs that men nothing other than a colonial mentality. Time to change the attire has long come
And so we should come up with local laws since law is basically ‘foreign’- people are still convicted on archaic 18th century laws! So you want them to be in Angoni attire? Female lawyers too? Discard the ‘colonial’ clothes covering your backside as well, reinvent the wheel!
50 years later and we are worried about the wigs being outdated and intimidating but not worried about the constitution. Both were left by the British and both for the same reasons. Zambia is amazing.
Surely those wigs make those people utterly silly mwe. Something should be done about them, and fast!!
And gone should the wedding dress, priestly cloaks, mayors attire, some of the military attire and numerous colonial dress codes!