* 35 years of independence and we still couldn’t produce our own citizen capable of leading a team of High Court judges?
* How many more years are we going to rely on foreign man power? And what exactly are the costs of these foreign professionals?
By Duncan Mlanjira
Retired Malawi Supreme Court of Appeal judge, Justice Dr Michael Charles Mtambo, has been sworn in as an acting Judge of the High Court of Namibia, for a period of three years.
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But some of that country’s citizenry have questioned the rationale of appointing an expatriate in their courts, with Mariane Mariane saying: “Are you telling us that we don’t have our own judges here in Namibia?
While Joe Ashipala said: “What happened to Namibian potential Acting Judges? 35 years [of independence] but we still couldn’t produce our own citizen capable of leading a team of High Court judges?
“How many more years are we going to rely on foreign man power? And what exactly are the costs of these foreign professionals?”
But Utaara Hoveka and several others defended the decision, saying: “This is an excellent appointment of a renown legal mind and jurist”, while Ohamba Moongo summed it up: “Foreign judges are better as they can take directions.”
A report by Namibia’s Judicial Commission indicated that Justice Mtambo’s Oath of Office was administered by Deputy Chief Justice, Petrus Damaseb, and that the three-year tenure was effective June 1, 2026.
Mtambo served as Judge of the Malawi High Court of Malawi from 2007 to 2022, sitting in both the Commercial Division and the Constitutional Court at the Blantyre Registry.
During his judicial tenure, he adjudicated a range of significant commercial and constitutional matters, including cases involving corporate insolvency, bankruptcy, and constitutional interpretation.
Born on September 6, 1957, Justice Mtambo holds a Bachelor of Laws (LLB-Hons) from the University of Malawi (1980) and has two Master of Laws degrees from the Universities of London (1985) and Pennsylvania (1991.
He went on to attain a PhD from North Easten University in the US in 1995 and he is also a Fellow of Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (FCIArb)-London.
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He was appointed Judge of the High Court on April 2, 2007 and before joining the Malawi Judiciary, he was a legal practitioner in private practice.
In June 2015, he was appointed a Judge of the Common Market for Eastern & Southern Africa (COMESA) Court-Appellate Division.
Justice Mtambo follows the footprints of Chief Justice Richard Banda (Rerired) who served as Chief Justice CJ of eSwatini — then known as Swaziland while current Deputy Chief Justice Lovemore Chikopa served as a judge in Zambia, hearing a matter involving a Zambian judge.
