An amendment to the military judiciary law raises several questions, reports Mona El-Nahhas The Higher Council of the Armed Forces on Saturday introduced minor amendments that might have big repercussions to Law 25/1966 regulating the military judiciary. The enactment states that the military judiciary is an independent judicial body which enjoys total immunity and independence like all other judicial bodies. According to the new amendment, army officers accused of illicit gains during service should be referred to the military judiciary. The enactment asserts that the military judiciary has the sole authority to hear such cases even if an investigation starts after the officers accused reach the age of retirement. In this connection, a military prosecution will enjoy the same authority entitled to other investigative bodies that are defined in the illicit gains law. If the crime was not committed during military service, the military prosecution will refer the case to the concerned investigation body. While some legal experts view the amendment as acceptable, others express concern. "It's good to give the military judiciary independence," says Atef El-Banna, a professor of constitutional law. "This means that military judges would pass court rulings without being influenced or directed by their seniors. However, we still need to understand what would guarantee such independence." Will an independent budget be allocated to the military judiciary? Will its judges be immune from dismissal? And will the military judiciary no longer be affiliated to the Defence Ministry? All the questions were voiced by legal experts who said they found no clear answers in the recently issued enactment. In civil judiciary, legal experts argue, judges are granted wider guarantees that would ensure their independence while passing rulings. Still, they seek further guarantees that would ultimately separate them from the executive authority represented by the Justice Ministry. Calls for transferring the affiliation of the judicial inspection department from the Justice Ministry to the Supreme Judiciary Council have been voiced by reformist judges for years. They say justice ministers during the era of former president Hosni Mubarak abused the authority to question judges as a means of intimidating them. "Instead of responding to our calls for an independent judiciary, judges were surprised by a new law trying to lend the military judiciary independence," said reformist judge Hisham Geneina, former secretary-general of the Judges Club. Geneina has reservations over the way the enactment was issued. "I think it's a military order rather than a law. We don't have the luxury of discussing it or knowing its regulations and the timing of its issuance," Geneina says. According to judge Ahmed Mekki, deputy chief justice of the Cassation Court, the judiciary authority should be dealt with as a unified body. "This means that all people should be tried before one judiciary, the civil judiciary," Mekki says. "Trying army officers before a military judiciary should be restricted to very limited crimes related mainly to disciplinary issues within the military institution. Otherwise, it would be considered an aggression to the idea of the civil judge." Mekki notes that illicit gains is not in any way just a military crime. "So, the person who commits it, whether a military man or a civilian, should be tried before a civil court." Former deputy chief justice of the Cassation Court Mahmoud El-Khodeiri says he was worried about the "hidden intention" behind issuing such an enactment. "Some claim that certain army officers during Mubarak's time were involved in several crimes of illicit gain," El Khodeiri says. "I still hope the enactment does not aim at lending any kind of protection to corrupt army officers," he adds. Mekki agrees with El-Khodeiri, stressing that the enactment should not be used as a tool in the hands of the military leadership to punish or protect whoever it likes of its men. El-Khodeiri does not think the issue of the enactment at such a critical time is a legal manoeuvre to refer Mubarak to a military court. "If this happened, it would be a disaster. The public will explode with anger if it believes for a moment that Mubarak will receive any kind of protection during his trial," El-Khodeiri says. Professor El-Banna excludes the probability of trying Mubarak and former corrupt state officials with military origins before a military court. "The enactment will not be applied in the case of Mubarak and his men simply because the crime of illicit gains which they were accused of happened years after they left their military careers," El-Banna notes.
