By Matia Samuel Timatio
The Mayor of Yambio Municipality in Western Equatoria State has suspended the activities of Yambio B’Court barring it from rendering any judicial services to the people in the town over allegations that the Boma court has been issuing unwarranted divorce certificate to married couples.
The suspension of the B’Court came in a Municipal Order No.07/2022 AD issued by the Town Mayor of Yambio Municipality dated 16th June 2022 as seen by No. 1 Citizen Daily Newspaper.
The Municipal Order called for total suspension of the Yambio Boma Court known as B-court until further notice, adding that anybody found violating the order shall face full scale of the law.
The Mayor of Yambio Municipality John Singira said his office wants to establish what he termed as “Town Base Court” which is in line with the Local Government Act, a decision he said prompted the suspension of the activities of the Boma court that has been accused of breaking relationships forcefully without consensus being reached by couples.
“The suspension of this B court is true. Actually there were too much complains from the communities concerning divorce certificate being issued by the sub-chiefs who are working in the Boma Court every day. Issuing certificate of divorce is not easy like what is taking place in Yambio Boma court, we want to advice our chiefs to first analyze critically cases concerning marriages before passing their judgments” Singira asserted.
He stressed that for any case to reach divorce level, there are three things considered like when a man abandon his woman without proving food, when a man abandon a woman without shelter and when he fails to perform his duties on bed as a man that is when the woman can be given divorce letter by the Boma court but that has been not the case.
“I have evidences with me in my office about the sub-chiefs issuing divorced certificates to married couples without proper procedures and the suspension of the B-court is just for a while because we want to regulate the issue of the B court and C court by next week. I also want to tell the community of Yambio Town Municipality to be calm and take their cases to the deputy executive chief for solutions” John urged the public in Yambio Town.
Meanwhile the deputy executive chief of Yambio Municipality Edward Mombasa welcomed the suspension of the B court. “There are procedures to be taken when divorce letter is to be issued but that has not been the case in Yambio B court. In many cases, men have lost their wives and women have also lost their marriages in that B court because no proper procedures were taken. You find that a woman will go to the B court with only 6,000SSP to demand for divorce and the sub-chiefs will just issue the letter which is not correct” Edward explained.
He further said such kind of judgments in the B court has tarnished the image of chiefs and sub-chiefs in the municipality because when a man is issued with divorced letter without proper investigations, it might bring conflicts in the communities.
“Even our names as the chiefs are spoiled in the community. People are saying we are the causes of the divorce happening in their homes. We have received many threatening warnings from the men accusing sub-chiefs of freeing their wives without any reason. We are now fed-up from hearing such complaints from the communities that is why the B Court must be suspended so that things can be put in order” the deputy chief executive lamented.
“Cases of issuing divorce certificate are not for the B-Court to handle unless it’s being referred to by the police. The issue of defilement, someone has been cut with Panga and adultery cases are not to be handled by the B court. Issuing divorce letters for women anyhow will results into many women to remain single and number of prostitutions will arise in the communities and men will continue fighting over love issues” he reiterated.