LIPS are rather tight on the circumstances leading to the precipitated departure from the civil service of two High Court judges, namely Judge Aloysius Mujulizi and Judge Upendo Msuya, who a banner headline speculated as being linked to some unsolved controversies.
The case of Judge Mujulizi is more well known as it had to do with parliamentary debate on the payment of funds from a special central bank account tied to IPTL claims which was hastily dished out while the dispute persisted.
Apparently, the second judge handled delicate cases that had to with drug trafficking, a less known matter.
A State House statement acknowledging that President John Magufuli had accepted resignation of the judges did not say why they had resigned, which leaves doubters groping for explanations.
One possibility is that they were asked to resign and they complied, but it doesn’t say whether it was fromthe Judiciary that this push came from since in both cases there were matters for Judiciary administrators to handle, rather than wait for orders from the State House.
As there has been a change of top administration in the Judiciary, chances of a proper move were high.
Taking up a resignation method saves plenty of people from the burden of proof issue, and also saves those concerned from the trouble of letting the cat out of the bag as to who was who in this or that controversy.
Resigning isn’t proof of any wrongdoing having taken place but, as founder President Julius Nyerere once intimated, ‘the wife of Caesar should not be under any iota of suspicion’ for any wrongdoing as that would be enough for her being dumped.
In that sense judges may also resign for being suspected of wrongdoing, even if statutes would require harder proof.
Looking at what has been taking place in the fifth phase government, top public officials have been shown the door not after the burden of proof had been resolved on their actual wrongdoing, but merely for their being top functionaries of suspicious ethical probity.
That was the case for an avalanche of dismissals of top officials, especially heads of executive agencies and some parastatal organisations as well as scores of ministerial departments. In that case asking the judges to resign is more or less the same act, but more modestly carried out.
While these resignations were being announced there were other departures from the public service and political leadership, including that of erstwhile Kilimanjaro Regional Commissioner Said Meck Sadick, who, along with Judge Msuya, were alsobeing said to be sick and not quite able to attend to their responsibilities.
That would soften the situation somewhat, where at any rate nothing was being said of RC Sadick in a controversial manner, in contrast with the two judges, or at least in the wake of their resignation.
It also means the pressure might not have been that strong for the judges to resign, that the attendant factor was also at work, for one or both. Still there is something salutary for three top level public service or governmental resignations to be announced on the same day, whatever other factors might have played into that situation.
If these moves were entirely voluntary in character, what miracle makes them come about literally on the same day, and all of them being accepted by the president at virtually the same time?
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