‘I want to improve efficiency of AG’s office’

The new Attorney (AG) General Kalekeni Kaphale has come into his office at a time when the Ministry of Justice is at the heart of prosecution of Cashgate cases. Coming from the private sector where he represented accused persons in cashgate, Kaphale explains to staff reporter Rebecca Chimjeka on how he will carry out his new role.

Q. Congratulation for being appointed as new AG. How does it feel to hold such a position?

A.

Thank you. Well what does one say? It’s a humbling experience in the sense that you can have one Attorney General. To head the bar in the country,… to be principal adviser to the whole government and you know government is not just Capital Hill, it conducts its business all over the country to the remotest part and it also has its three main arms; Judiciary, Executive and the Legislature.

So, it’s an enormous task that lies ahead of me and I can only hope that with the training that I have had and the expedience that I bring along, I should be able to manage the job. Not that I am doubting myself, I don’t think I am. Actually weeks into the office, I now feel a lot at ease with the task. I know there are going to be tough times, tough and hard decision to be made but I believe that with the team of lawyers supporting me in the Attorney General chambers and the lawyers that we do have in Malawi who are of high calibre and quality, I should be able to handle the office.

Q. What do you do you intend to do during the time you will be in office?

A

. Well, my vision is to take on from where my predecessor left and build on structures that he left so as to improve efficiency of service delivery by the Attorney General’s office. My vision is to run it on the of a model of a private law firm which has to maintain a high level of efficiency to be competitive on the market of course realising as well that we have resource constraints so that vision may not be easy to achieve. But with the little that we have, we should be able to organise ourselves in such a manner that we are not only responsive to emerging legal problems but also plan ahead so that we are able to avoid legal problems well in advance. This we plan to do by studying the profile of legal problems that we normally have; where do most of the problems arise from? Could it be they arise from those areas because there is gap in legal knowledge on key decision makers in those ministers and departments? Can we train them how to make quality decisions?

Apart from training them, we are also toying around with idea and we have to perfect it, officers in the Attorney General’s department working as liaison officers or desk officers serving in particular ministries and government departments, so you can have one or two lawyers that will on a regulars basis liaise with principal secretaries and key officials in particular ministries so much so that they are able to talk to them and understand what regal processes and legal decisions are being thought about are being considered in the ministries and give advice as the decisions are being made

Q. You have been representing some people in the Cashgate scandal, what will happen to your clients?

A.

For those cases that I once had a hand in, I will not be in a position to make any input at all to whatever decisions the DPP will have to make. In such cases instead of me giving the direction, I think I will delegate my oversight functions to key officers here. I have a very competent Solicitor General and I have a very competent Chief State Advocate who will be able to give guidance to the director of public prosecutions. I would like to Chinese-wall myself, as it were from those cases, be they civil as well as criminal. Those I had handled earlier, I will not have to deal with those but officers under me will have complete autonomy to make decisions on those.

Q.

What will happen to the law firm that you were running?

A.

I am negotiating with one or two lawyers to take over and run the firm. You know, I would have to leave it behind. I mean people leave so many things and not just a law firm.

Q.

Why haven’t you yet?

A.

Remember, it was a legal firm. It was not a store selling tomatoes. They are a lot of things that we have to talk about like at what price does it go? Who does the evaluation of the value of the firm and all that. I have indentified very good lawyers to take over from me because it will be sad if the firm was to go under simply because I am no longer in it. So, I will dispose of my share in the firm. Some people will take it up. I am here on a three- year contract and maybe God willing, who knows. What I will do from here nobody can tell, but the firm will be left in good hands.

Q.

Majority of Malawians have no access to justice as we are have a backload of cases in the courts, what are you going to do to change the status quo.

A.

That’s a very important question. I had a meeting with representatives of judges of High Court. We were discussing things such as their condition of service and one of the issues I raised with them was the need for the Judiciary to have a performance management system. A performance appraisal system. You don’t want the Judiciary to always come with a begging bowl, asking for money when they are not delivering. They should have a system for rendering, quality and timely service to the populous then and only then can they justify a claim for better terms and conditions. So, it’s an issue that we have take note of. It did not start today. It’s an ongoing problem, but they have promised that they will improve on that and we also would want them to improve because its only when they improve that then they can wish for the world and the world can be given to them.