Africa-Press – Mauritius. Everyone is already aware of the abusive practice of provisional charges in our justice system, the purpose of which is to arrest and incarcerate suspects, among whom we often find human rights activists or political opponents.
Fortunately, the courts have struck out these charges in some cases. The risk of abuse of legal procedures always exists if the judiciary is not vigilant.
Last week we had an example of the misuse of another legal procedure, notably the ex parte request to freeze the assets of a person suspected of being involved in some illicit trade or perceived to be of other side of the political spectrum.
First, what is an ex parte request? In the fight against fraud, corruption and money laundering, the ex parte request is a procedure used by a regulatory body, a tax authority or an investigative agency, to ask a judge to grant it authorization, among other things:
(a) access the bank accounts of a person suspected of having underdeclared their income or of not having declared it to the tax authorities;
(b) to freeze the assets of a person suspected of having accumulated illicit funds or of practicing money laundering, pending the completion of an investigation.
In principle, an ex parte application is filed before a judge by a party (applicant) in the absence of the suspect party as an emergency measure to obtain information from a third party (e. g. a bank) about the suspicious party or to freeze the assets of the suspicious party.
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