The situation is not normal and there is a lot of panic among judicial officers after the newly appointed Deputy Chief Justice Dr Flavian Zeija stopped the newly appointed Supreme Court Justice from vacating the new chambers until he clears his huge case backlog at the Court of Appeal which also doubles as the Constitutional Court.
Highly placed sources at the Court of Appeal confirmed to this website that even though Justice Zeija has not yet officially entered the office of the Deputy Chief Justice, because he is still sitting in the Office of the Principal Judge at the Criminal Division of the High Court building, he recently used his fresh powers to direct the said justice to first clear his desk before going to the Supreme Court building.
“ Even though Justice Richard Butera is still in the Office of the Deputy Chief Justice, the Principal Judge is number three in judiciary ranks so he has the powers to direct Supreme Court justices to do something. He used that power to stop him from going to the Supreme Court building where he was going to assign him new files to handle without clearing his desk behind, I think he made his decision in good faith,” a judiciary source said.
He added that Dr Zeija didn’t want other justices on the particular panel to write and finish their judgements and wait to deliver until their colleague had settled in the new office and wrote his judgement. He wanted everything to be cleared before new assignments were given to this new justice at their new station.
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“I think by the end of this month or the coming month, he will have finished with writing his judgments and hit his new station. You know when new judges and justices were sworn in, the President cautioned them about the backlog. He wants Ugandans to get justice in time and that is what Dr Zeija wants to implement. Surprisingly, the said justice finally cleared his desk and his instrument will be released which take him to the Supreme Court,” the source added.
On the issue of justice Butera, he said that they thought that he was handing over the office on the 14th April because it is his retirement date, “but he is still working and the laws allow him until three months, maybe he is cleaning his desk,” he added.
