Monrovia – Chief Justice Francis S. Korkpor is expected to rule into a motion filed by defense lawyers of Justice Kabineh Ja’neh calling for his recusal into
Report by Henry Karmo, [email protected]
The Chief justice is expected to render
According him the Chief justice who is now supposed to preside on the Kabineh case signed a judgment which is being used as one of the counts making the 11 counts used by the House of Representatives to impeach Ja’neh.
He also argued that because the Chief justice signed an opinion in the Annie Constant case, he is a subject to subpoena to serve as witness if necessary and if that is done it could compromise the role of the presiding in the trial.
In other arguments lawyers representing the legal interest of the House of Representatives argued that for the chief Justice to do so will amount to treason and if he to consider recusing himself.
“You have made a determination in the matter and that matter is a subject for the determination of an impeachment trial your honor. You are conflicted in the madman Annie Constant Case you signed an opinion your honor and this is why we are calling on you to recuse yourself your honor,” defense lawyer Arthur Johnson.
For his part, Cyrenius Cephas argued that the motion had no legal and factual bases because the trial is being held under rule 63 of the senate standing rules since the case is a legislative proceeding.
“Your authority to preside is given in article 43 of the constitution of Liberia and there is nowhere in that article calls for giveaway that constitutional authority will amount to treason which might cause your impeachment.”
Last Thursday, the Chief Justice Francis S. Korkpor could not proceed with Senate’s impeachment trial against Supreme Court Justice Kabineh Ja’neh due to a motion calling on him to recuse himself from presiding for “legal and factual” reasons.
The Motion was filed Wednesday by Justice Ja’neh before the Supreme Court, calling on the Chief Justice to step aside from the impeachment hearing at the Senate “in the interest of justice and fair play”.
Returning to status quo
On Thursday morning, the team of lawyers representing Justice Ja’neh filed another petition seeking a prohibition on the impeachment trial at the Senate. They requested in the petition that the Senate’s amended Rule 63 which would have guided impeachment proceeding be trashed in line with Article 43 of the Constitution.
The petition: “Article 43 of the 1986 of the Republic of Liberia provides that the Legislature shall prescribe the procedures for impeachment which shall be in conformity with the requirement of due process of law.
Petitioner submits that Chapter 5, captioned ‘the Legislature, Article 29 thereof, provides that the legislative power of the Republic shall be vested in the legislature of Liberia which shall consist of two (2) separate houses: A Senate and a House of Representatives, both of which must pass on all legislations. Accordingly, when the Constitution requires the legislature to prescribe the rules for impeachment, to conform with the requirement of due process, the Constitution contemplated that both Houses, Senate and Representatives shall jointly prescribe the rule for impeachment.
Petitioner submits and says that in the absence of the enactment of the procedure for impeachment proceedings as required by Article 43 of the Constitution of Liberia, Prohibition will lie to prohibit ongoing acts and threat of future acts which are ultra vires…”