Appointment and Term As Chief Justice
Sir Buri was appointed Chief Justice in 1980 by the Government of Prime Minister Sir Julius Chan, who took office after the Government of Prime Minister Michael Somare had been defeated in a no-confidence motion in Parliament following the Rooney Affair, an early crisis of judicial independence during which the first Chief Justice, Sir Sydney Frost, an Australian, and three expatriate puisne justices resigned (see Law of Papua New Guinea).
During his term as Chief Justice Sir Buri secured independent financing of the judiciary, with a separate appropriation bill, so that its budget was not in the control of the Justice Minister from time to time. Indeed, during Sir Buri’s ten-year (plus three years) term of office as Chief Justice the superior courts of Papua New Guinea rigorously maintained an independent role for the courts vis-à-vis the executive and the legislature — a position which Lady Kidu (now Dame Carol Kidu) feels was vital in the decision of the Wingti Government to oust him as Chief Justice in 1993 when his statutory ten-year term had elapsed.
Read more about this topic: Buri Kidu
Famous quotes containing the words appointment, term, chief and/or justice:
“Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)
“Mr. Roosevelt, this is my principal request—it is almost the last request I shall ever make of anybody. Before you leave the presidential chair, recommend Congress to submit to the Legislatures a Constitutional Amendment which will enfranchise women, and thus take your place in history with Lincoln, the great emancipator. I beg of you not to close your term of office without doing this.”
—Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906)
“These are our grievances which we have thus laid before his majesty with that freedom of language and sentiment which becomes a free people, claiming their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“Though Justice against Fate complain,
And plead the antient Rights in vain:
But those do hold or break
As Men are strong or weak.”
—Andrew Marvell (1621–1678)