By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
Western Cape Judge President John Hlophe is set to appeal a court ruling relating to his legal battle against the Judicial Service Commission (JSC).
The Johannesburg High Court on Thursday dismissed Hlophe’s review application which sought to have the JSC’s gross misconduct findings against him set aside.
While Hlophe wanted the matter to go back to the commission, the judge had asked the high court to order Parliament to conduct its own investigation into the allegations of misconduct rather than vote on his impeachment.
After studying the judgment, Hlophe’s lawyer Barnabas Xulu has indicated that the ruling will be appealed.
Speaking to 702, Xulu said the grounds for the appeal is that the initial decision was based on a new law and, therefore, the judgment “was bad in law”.
“After consultation with our client, we have received instructions to make a leave to appeal before the Gauteng High Court the entire judgment on the grounds that there’s a new law that this judgment come up with,” he said.
The judgment] does not reflect the established jurisprudence on constitutional and legal issues, which talks of the composition of the statutory body and that statutory body has not been properly constituted,” Xulu added.
The lawyer said given that this was a new law altogether it was important that “another court must agree with the judgment or disagree with it”.
Hlophe’s impeachment stems from the JSC’s August 2021 findings.
At the time, the JSC found that Hlophe had improperly tried to cajole two Constitutional Court (ConCourt) justices to violate their oaths of office by ruling in favour of former president Jacob Zuma.
The matter related to the validity of searches during the arms deal investigation of Zuma and French arms company Thales’ local subsidiary, Thint, in 2008.