Swearing-in of a second class magistracy at the Maseru Magistrate court this week has been described as a means to help professional personnel to speed up delivery of justice.

In an interview with LENA, Ms. Palesa Rantara, who will be joining three others in the cadre, said she is now faced with different challenges such as delivering justice by presiding over civil and criminal cases.

Ms. Rantara said she is no new in the law fraternity as she became a court clerk way back in the 1990's.

She indicated that she later stepped the ladder to becoming the court president, and also joined high judiciary class. After completing her studies, she said, she established an office of victims of crime support.

She indicated that the office was responsible for providing awareness of victim's rights as envisaged in the United Nations (UN) declaration, hold discussions aimed at reducing the impact of crime on the victim and to inform victims about their role in interacting with the Criminal Justice
process.

There are different hierarchies in the magistracy level such as second class magistrate, first class magistrate, president magistrate, senior resident magistrate and chief magistrate of which there are three chief magistrate based in the south, north and central part of the country.

Meanwhile, the Maseru magistrate court has three senior resident magistrates, two resident magistrates and four second class magistrates.

Source: LENA 10/10/2007