Africa-Press – South-Africa. The Judicial Service Commission (JSC) has announced that it will recommend three people to President Cyril Ramaphosa for appointment to the Gauteng High Court Bench.
The JSC interviewed eight candidates on Thursday for four vacancies, but decided to only choose three.
Rochelle Francis-Subbiah, advocate Stuart Wilson, and advocate Jan Jacobus Swanepoel were announced as the three on Thursday evening.
During the interviews, Francis-Subbiah told the JSC that if more women were to be appointed to the Bench, it would send a message that women presiding over gender-based violence (GBV) matters were “concerned about their plight”.
Francis-Subbiah described GBV as a “pandemic in our country”.
Wilson told the JSC that he didn’t find judicial work “unengaging at all”.
He said:
Judge President Basheer Waglay expressed a concern that the position might be too limiting for Wilson and that he could, over time, feel “despondent”.
Wilson is a seasoned constitutional lawyer and acting judge at the High Court.
“When you act in a position, it’s enjoyable because you’re doing those matters for a term. When it becomes permanent, a full-time job, you’re effectively changing your lifestyle or what you’ve done in the past to something very different. My concern is, are you ready to abandon that passion and take on [this new role]?”
Wilson responded that it would be an adjustment from his public law practice, but that he would not be abandoning his passion for constitutional matters.
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He said the Socio-Economic Rights Institute (SERI) of SA, which he founded, would continue to champion the issues he cares about. This, he added, would allow him to explore other aspects of the law.
He hadn’t had an “uninteresting week” during his stint at the High Court, he added, because the job challenged him intellectually.
“There are no two cases alike, and the facts are always different. The law is always slightly different,” he said.
Although he is known as a constitutional lawyer, he is well-versed in other respects, including labour and criminal law, he added.
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