Hearing held for Judge Abdullah

A hearing for the case filed by Chief Judge of Criminal Court Abdullah Mohamed (Judge Abdullah) against Judicial Service Commission (JSC) was held today at the presence of two additional Judges at Civil Court.

The two Judges who joined the case in addition to Mariyam Nihayath were Aisha Shujoon Mohamed and Hathif Hilmy.

Judge Abdullah has requested the court to void JSC’s decision that he had acted against disciplinary standards.

Judge Abdullah’s lawyer Guraidhoo MP Ibrahim Riza said that there is no legal or judicial basis for JSC’s claims made at previous hearings of the case.

He said that while it had been ruled that Judge Abdullah was guilty of disciplinary misconduct, it was not clear what legal or judicial ground this was based on.

Riza said that JSC had based their decision on a statement made by Judge Abdullah, when he referred to former President Nasheed’s cabinet during an interview with DhiTV in 2009. Judge Abdullah had said that the members of the former government had been acting like they were on the verge of taking their last breath.

However when the two DhiTV personnel who conducted the interview were summoned to JSC and questioned regarding this statement by Judge Abdullah, they had indicated that Judge Abdullah had made no such statement.

Riza said that back then, there did not exist a Judges’ regulation or a disciplinary standard for Judges.

JSC’s lawyer posed two questions to Judge Abdullah at today’s hearing.

One was whether JSC presented him a report indicating that he had been found guilty of disciplinary misconduct, and the other why he did not file a complaint to JSC if he was not satisfied with the contents of this report.

Riza replied that looking at the way things had been conducted, there did not seem to be much point in going back to JSC with this complaint; prompting Judge Abdullah to take the matter to court.

Judge Nihayath gave JCS ten days to present its statement to the court as requested by JSC, before ending today’s hearing.