Swaziland’s chief justice said on Thursday he had resigned in the aftermath of a dramatic showdown between the southern African nation’s modern court system and its absolute monarchy.
Chief Justice Stanley Sapire said he had decided to resign following what he described as the ongoing defiance of court orders by government officials and after he was informed last week by King Mswati III that he would be demoted.
Sapire’s resignation adds to a long list of vacant legal positions in the country.
Last December, the country’s six Court of Appeal judges resigned and lawyers went on strike after the government announced it would ignore an Appeal Court, saying that King Mswati III had no constitutional power to override his Parliament.
Commonwealth Secretary General Don McKinnon recently advised the Swazi monarchy to find lasting solutions to the judicial and political crises in the country or risk being kicked out of the 54-nation Commonwealth of Britain and its former territories.
Mswati III, Africa’s last absolute monarch, rules his one million subjects by decree. – Sapa-AP