Ask anyone about his or her experiences with our courts and chances are that you’d be met with a rolling of the eyes and a visible shudder. Our courts, set up to mete out swift and wise judgment, seem to be paying little consideration to the needs of the public they are meant to serve.
Judges come from diverse backgrounds and regions, and with varying degrees of education. As judgments are predisposed to be in line with our Shariah, interpretation of such laws is often left to the individual meting out justice. And individual judges are habitually influenced by their own personal beliefs in the Shariah, which in this country can vary from the very harsh to the fairly lenient. It is not unusual to hear about some out-of-the-ordinary judgment handed out by our courts.
There is also the matter of time. How long a person waits for a verdict to be delivered is very much at the whim of the judge appointed to hear his case. And cases have been known to drag for months and years to reach any form of resolution. Also, the general view the public holds on our esteemed judges is that they rarely appear in court on time. I myself have had to wait long hours on several occasions before the judge finally made his way to his office.
I also remember a recent experience that taxed a lot of my time and patience with our esteemed judges. Applying for a Saudi passport for my wife, I had collected the necessary 37 documents and what seemed a thousand or so affidavits as required by the Civil Bureau.
One of the last steps in my pursuit was to appear before a judge to get one of the papers approved.
After several trips to the court, I finally managed to garner an audience with the appointed judge. Giving my documents a cursory glance, he demanded that I produce an attestation that my wife was a Muslim. I replied that such a document did exist in the large file in front of him. As he shuffled endlessly through my file, I quickly pointed out the certification issued by the Islamic Institute in Los Angeles.
“But that’s in English and from a foreign country,” he replied sternly as he pushed my file away. “You have to get one in Arabic and from our courts. Go over to the Islamization section and get one”
Exasperated at the thought of a further delay, I countered. “But Sheikh X, my wife is a Muslim, has performed Haj, been to Makkah and Madinah several times. English, Sanskrit or French, what difference does it make? Is Islam any different here than in a foreign country? Now why would I need another paper to add to this voluminous file?”
“That is the law. Now go on and don’t waste my time any further,” he admonished. Defeated, I made my way to the section only to be told that the translator who was to hear my wife’s Shehada or claim to Islam was on vacation for two months. “Two months!” I yelled at the clerk manning an unkempt desk. “What am I supposed to do until then? This matter is already dragging for a year now between the several bureaucracies, and I want it to finish now.” He shrugged me off, telling me he couldn’t do anything to help me.
With rising temper I made my way back to Sheikh X. This matter had been dragging for months, and I had to put an end to it. I felt I had an ace in my pocket that I was going to spring on him as a last resort. “Look at the marriage certificate that was performed in theses courts some years ago, Sheikh X, and tell me who the presiding judge was?”
With some reluctance, he shuffled through my file again, until he came upon the copy. “Now tell me Sheikh, isn’t that your name, stamp, signature and validation underneath? And what exactly is stated by where my wife’s religion is supposed to be.”
With my blood now racing to boiling and sensing the stonewall beginning to crumble, I continued my attack. “And didn’t you yourself claim her guardianship, as she had no family members here?
And if she was a Muslim then, why in God’s name does she need another piece of paper claiming that?”
He stared at the paper for what seemed to be a long time, glared back at me for even longer, and finally with great reluctance put his signature and stamp on the required papers. Gathering my file quickly and before he had a chance to change his mind, I bolted out of his office and the court building without a glance backwards.
How many such bizarre instances are re-lived by people? How much productive time is lost as we shuffle from one bureaucracy to another?
Codifying our system of justice is being understandably resisted by some. But as we collectively try to raise public consciousness to put our houses in order, let us not ignore our courts and system of justice.
