Mugabe appoints three new judges

President Robert Mugabe has added three new seats to the Supreme Court by appointing three judges seen as stalwarts of his ZANU-PF ruling party, the state-controlled ‘Herald’ reported on Friday, Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa said the additional judges were needed to handle litigation by white farmers “who are contesting and indeed frustrating the government’s land reform programme”, according to the report. White farmers, through the Commercial Farmers’ Union (CFU), have already won a Supreme Court ruling declaring the violence-wracked land reforms unconstitutional, but individual farmers continue to press claims to retain their farms.

Chinamasa did not say when the new judges - Misheck Cheda, Vernanda Ziyambi and Luke Malaba - would take the bench. Under Zimbabwean law, Mugabe has unrestricted powers to appoint judges or to expand the size of the bench. His appointments are reviewed only by the Judicial Services Commission, which is also filled with Mugabe appointees, the report said.

“The real reason for the new appointments is an attempt to further ZANU-ize the judiciary in this country,” said Tendai Biti, a leading constitutional lawyer and an MP for the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). “Fortunately the men and women who have been appointed are men and women of integrity,” Biti said. “The intended subordination of the Supreme Court through the appointment of judges who are perceived as sympathetic to the Mugabe regime is not going to succeed,” he was quoted saying.