Deputy Chief Justice Kalpana Rawal at a past event. She has filed an
application to challenge her retirement. FILE PHOTO | NATION MEDIA
GROUP
The High Court has temporarily stopped the Judicial Service Commission from recruiting a new Deputy Chief Justice.
Judges
Richard Mwongo, Weldon Korir, Christine Meoli, Hedwig Ong'udi and
Charles Kamau ruled that the commission should not continue with the
process to replace Justice Kalpana Rawal for 45 days to enable them
conclude the dispute over her retirement age.
“The
dispute has raised weighty constitution issues which require full
hearing before we make a determination of the correct age for judges to
retire. We are therefore persuaded to suspend the recruitment process
for 45 days,” ruled the judges.
Justice Rawal wants the
commission to withdraw a retirement notice they served her and stop
receiving applications for her position.
She argues
that she was appointed under the old constitution, which allows her to
sit in the Judiciary until she attains 74 years.
Her
lawyers, George Oraro and Kioko Kilukumi, had argued that any move to
replace her would be illegal since her appointment was not subject to
the current constitution, which limits retirement ages of judges to 70
years.
“Any recruitment and appointment of a
replacement for the DCJ will result in a constitutional crisis as there
will be two persons occupying the same office.
“There will be no vacancy in the DCJ office in January 2016 as Justice Rawal will still be in office,” said Oraro.
The
JSC on September 1 served Lady Justice Rawal with a retirement notice
and subsequently put an advert in the dailies inviting suitable
candidates to apply for her position.
According to the
JSC, they wanted the recruitment to begin and conclude early to avoid a
vacuum when Justice Rawal retires on January 15, 2016 upon turning 70
years.
No comments:
Post a Comment