Judiciary Set to Open the 2023/24 Judicial Year with a Sherry

The beginning of the 2023/2024 judicial year will be marked by a Sherry Party which will take place on Friday, 6th October, 2023 from 8:30 am to about 12:30pm at the Chichiri Court House in the city of Blantyre, Malawi’s current judicial capital.

Besides the sherry, which will be taken at the end of the event, a number of activities have been lined up.

These include, an inspection of a guard of honour by the Honourable the Chief Justice at the Parade Square that will be mounted by the Malawi Police Service (MPS); speeches by the Honourable the Chief Justice himself as the head of the Malawi Judiciary, the Honourable Attorney General as the head of the Malawi Bar and the Chairperson of the Malawi Law Society. Legal practitioners across the country, court staff and media houses, both print and electronic, have been invited to cover the event.

The judicial year comprises four sittings when judges sit to hear cases and deliver their judgments.

The first sitting, called the “Lewis Chatsika sitting”, commences on the first Tuesday of October of one year, which this year falls on 3rd October and ends on the last Thursday before the Christmas Day of the same year. Three more sittings will be had in the year namely, the “Friday Makuta sitting”, the “Richard Banda sitting” and the “Leonard Unyolo sitting”.

The sittings which initially had English names when the High Court of Malawi was using Rules of the Supreme Court 1965, and as amended from time to time, as its major source of civil procedure law and practice, were localized in 2017 in honour of Malawi’s former Chief Justices when Malawi adopted its own civil procedure rules, called the Courts (High Court) (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2017.

The Sherry Party affords the legal profession in Malawi an opportunity to take stock of how things have been generally and chat the way forward on how some areas may be improved.

The beginning of the 2023/2024 judicial year will be marked by a Sherry Party which will take place on Friday, 6th October, 2023 from 8:30 am to about 12:30pm at the Chichiri Court House in the city of Blantyre, Malawi’s current judicial capital.

Besides the sherry, which will be taken at the end of the event, a number of activities have been lined up.

These include, an inspection of a guard of honour by the Honourable the Chief Justice at the Parade Square that will be mounted by the Malawi Police Service (MPS); speeches by the Honourable the Chief Justice himself as the head of the Malawi Judiciary, the Honourable Attorney General as the head of the Malawi Bar and the Chairperson of the Malawi Law Society. Legal practitioners across the country, court staff and media houses, both print and electronic, have been invited to cover the event.

The judicial year comprises four sittings when judges sit to hear cases and deliver their judgments.

The first sitting, called the “Lewis Chatsika sitting”, commences on the first Tuesday of October of one year, which this year falls on 3rd October and ends on the last Thursday before the Christmas Day of the same year. Three more sittings will be had in the year namely, the “Friday Makuta sitting”, the “Richard Banda sitting” and the “Leonard Unyolo sitting”.

The sittings which initially had English names when the High Court of Malawi was using Rules of the Supreme Court 1965, and as amended from time to time, as its major source of civil procedure law and practice, were localized in 2017 in honour of Malawi’s former Chief Justices when Malawi adopted its own civil procedure rules, called the Courts (High Court) (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2017.

The Sherry Party affords the legal profession in Malawi an opportunity to take stock of how things have been generally and chat the way forward on how some areas may be improved.