Another judge withdraws from ConCourt interviews
In what a Business Day report suggests is an unprecedented show of no confidence in the JSC, a third candidate to fill vacancies on the Constitutional Court Bench withdrew yesterday. The paper reports that Judge Shehnaz Meer, of the Western Cape High Court and Land Claims Court, is the third to withdraw - after SCA judges Belinda van Heerden and Robert Nugent.
Her withdrawal comes amid talk of a loss of confidence in the JSC, which is conducting the interviews. JSC secretary Vuyelwa Masangwana confirmed that Meer had withdrawn, and said she did not give reasons. Meer was believed to have stood a good chance, says the report. It is understood that she was twice before on the list of candidates recommended by the JSC to the President. A source close to the JSC said candidacies for judicial office had withdrawn before, usually because there was an unresolved complaint against a candidate, but there was 'nothing like this'. The report says former Constitutional Court Judge Johann Kriegler managed to persuade four of them to stay in the race, but could not persuade Nugent, who had told Kriegler that he was 'not prepared to submit his candidacy to the deliberations of people he does not trust'.
Full Business Day report
JSC interview timetable
A behind-the-scenes deal lay behind the JSC's appointment to the SCA of South Gauteng High Court Judge Frans Malan, claims a Mail & Guardian report. The M&G claims it has been reliably informed that SCA President Lex Mpati had to agree not to oppose the appointment of former acting Northern Cape Judge President Ronnie Bosielo in order to appoint Malan, a badly needed expert in banking law. It says it was told by 'a well-placed source' that 'Mpati had pleaded with some members of the JSC who were vehemently opposed to appointing another white male to the country's second court'. Mpati 'had to agree not to object to Bosielo in exchange for the appointment of Malan'. The M&G quotes its source as saying: 'Malan is the expert on banking law. Nobody can match him, certainly nobody in the SCA,' said the paper's source.
Full report on the Mail & Guardian Online site