When President James Michel delivered his State of the Nation address on the 14th February 2008, he made one of the most astounding statements ever about the judiciary in
The justice system, in contrast, has been left to its own devices and as a result suffers from chronic under-funding, blatant mismanagement and administrative near collapse. Plans to build a modern Supreme Court building dating back to 1993 has never seen the lights of day. Mr. Wilby Lucas, SPPF MNA for Biae Lazare lamented in the National Assembly last week that court cases are now being fixed for 2009 as the back log of cases continue to mount. He said, we need more courts, judges and magistrates. He said that the government has to revise the scheme of service for Magistrates to encourage young lawyers to switch from a career at the Bar to one on the Bench. Case management ought to be implemented quickly to deal with the worrying trend in the judiciary, he advised.
Another worrying trend is the amount of time people who has fallen afoul of the malfunctioning justice system spent on remand before they go to trial. In some cases people spend years on remand before they eventually gets put on trial. After spending years incarcerated at the request of the prosecution, most of these people are then released after the prosecution fails to prove guilt. A case in point is the 4Kg of heroin which was seized recently and the lady put on trial. She was later acquitted by Judge Bernadin Renaud, because there was insufficient evidence to get a conviction.
Arguably the greatest obstacle to justice is delay. Nowhere is this more apparent than in criminal cases. Mr. Lucas’ suggestion to have the Supreme Court divided into two divisions; criminal and civil, is thus a good idea which the government should seriously consider. The average wait on remand is 12 months and some individuals have waited for 3 years before their cases come to trial. The Attorney General’s Chambers routinely request for needless remand of individuals for the flimsiest of cases causing the government to incur unnecessary expenses as it housed, clothed, feed and maintain the remandees in prison. State prosecutors habitually charge individuals with little (or no admissible) evidence leading to unnecessary detention of individuals who will almost certainly be acquitted at trial. Although bail is a right under the constitution the court has always viewed it as a privilege and more often than not refuses bail when lawyers have made applications on behalf of their clients.
While on remand individuals languish in prison where they are subjected to inhumane and degrading treatment. Accusations of human rights abuses are also rife in prison but the Courts and the government seem powerless or unwilling to do anything about it. The effect of long remand on an individual cannot be overstated. Prison conditions are debilitating in the extreme. The prison is at double capacity. Most prisoners sleep sitting up or packed like sardines due to lack of floor space. Poor nutrition and sanitation result in serious health problems for detainees and inadequate health care means that the prisoners are at real risk of getting sick frequently in custody.
The unnecessary detention of a bread winner often has severe impact upon his family. The government should also consider legislative/constitutional reform, actions against the police and prison wardens for routine torture of suspects and working to reduce corruption by test cases and education.