LAZ adjourns Mushipe hearing

Sat, 19 Nov 2016 10:25:43 +0000

LAW Association of Zambia disciplinary committee has again failed to hear charges of professional misconduct against Lusaka lawyer Martha Mushipe.

Ms Mushipe said the matter could not take off yesterday owing to her inability to make submissions in response to allegations as she was held up by the busy schedule of elections petitions across the country.The UPND lawyer was summoned by the LAZ Legal Practitioners Committee for disciplinary hearing which threatened her practicing licence following allegations of professional misconduct exhibited during the presidential petition before the Constitutional Court.

“The matter has been adjourned to sometime in January 2017, they are yet to set a particular date but it has to be the last two weeks of the month. “The adjournment has been necessitated because of my busy calendar dealing with parliamentary petitions. I was unable to make submissions in response to the allegations before the committee,” she said.She was speaking outside the LAZ secretariat after appearing before the disciplinary committee that sat yesterday to hear her matter.

LAZ ordered through the disciplinary committee that Ms Mushipe exculpates herself in written submissions before November 18, failure to which they would proceed with their ruling based on the allegations. The Constitutional Court had complained to the Association that Ms Mushipe’s questionable conduct during the presidential petition hearing had the potential to put the image of the noble profession into disrepute.

LAZ in return wrote to Ms Mushipe in September 2016 to exonerate herself within a limited time, but later had adjourned the matter to November 18, 2016 (yesterday).  The Constitutional Court in its ruling of September 5, 2016 by the majority and the dissenting Judgment by Justice Hilda Chibomba, the president of the ConCourt, complained about Ms Mushipe before the Court and called on LAZ to take action against the lawyer.