KINSHASA (AFP) — Judges and magistrates Friday went on strike in the Democratic Republic of Congo to protest at recent court appointments by the government they find an unconstitutional threat to judicial independence.
A week-long strike was called by the country's biggest magistrates union, SYNAMAC, at a general assembly on Thursday, and widely followed in the capital Kinshasa, where all high court hearings were indefinitely postponed.
Judges were "concerned to uphold the state of law and the independence of the judiciary," SYNAMEC president Nsambayi Mutenda told AFP, saying the strike call concerned the courts and prosecutors in both the capital and provinces.
No disruption of judicial activity was reported in the provinces of the huge central African nation on the first day of the strike.
President Joseph Kabila and Prime Minister Antoine Gizenga early this week appointed 26 senior magistrates to the Supreme Court of Justice, to the prosecutor general's office and to the Court of Appeal in Kinshasa.
Nsambayi protested on Monday against this decree, stating that the "power to to nominate rests with the head of state on the recommendation of the higher council of magistrates and not on the recommendation of the justice minister."
Legislation on judicial reforms and setting up the higher council of magistrates still awaits a second reading in the DR Congo's Senate and the presidential decrees pleaded "exceptional circumstances" making it impossible to convene the council.
Kabila also put the president of the supreme court and the prosecutor general of the republic into retirement, with 90 other judges, either since they had reached the age of 65, or because their careers spanned 35 years.
The mass retirements were criticized by the union, which was concerned about the quality of their replacements and urged Kabila to reconsider measures that "systematically violate both the spirit and letter of the constitution".
SYNAMEC declared itself ready for talks with the head of state and "all the political institutions of the republic" to ensure that the judiciary functioned harmoniously.
The union also asked human rights and pro-democracy movements to support its "action aimed at improving ... the legal bodies" and ensuring the protection of their independence.
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