Alphas Chitakunye

Justice Alphas Chitakunye
Image via Judicial Services Commission
Judge
Appointed by	President Robert Mugabe

Alphas Chitakunye is a Zimbabwean lawyer and a judge of the High Court of Zimbabwe. He was appointed by President Robert Mugabe in July 2013. Before his appointment as a High Court judge, Chitakunye served as an Administrative Court Judge. He was appointed to the Administrative Court on 2000. ^[1]

Notable Cases

Controversy

• In 2016, When the Judicial Services Commission (JSC) was conducting interviews for four positions of judges of the Supreme Court of Zimbabwe, and was reviewing cases in the three year period between 2013 and 2015, Chitakunye was found to have produced only 69 judgments compared to the highest figure of 333 delivered by another judge during the same period. He hardly wrote any judgements (a requirement for a Supreme Court judge) and claimed that he had his own peculiar way of solving the cases without going the judgment route. ^[2]

• When asked by then Deputy Chief Justice Luke Malaba if he understood the " principle of collegiality" and "the doctrine of stare decisis " ^[3]Chitakunye said no.