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The As­sem­bly of South­ern Lawyers (ASL) is call­ing on Chief Jus­tice Ivor Archie to com­mis­sion an in­de­pen­dent in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to what they de­scribed as ad­min­is­tra­tive fail­ures and de­lays plagu­ing the Fam­i­ly Courts, par­tic­u­lar­ly in the op­er­a­tions of the Mas­ters of the Court.

In a let­ter to Archie, the Ju­di­cial and Le­gal Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (JLSC) chair­man on April 29, ASL’s pres­i­dent Saira Lakhan out­lined wide­spread con­cerns from its mem­bers re­gard­ing chron­ic dock­et­ing de­lays, par­tic­u­lar­ly for non-con­tentious and do­mes­tic vi­o­lence mat­ters, which the as­sem­bly claimed is caus­ing emo­tion­al dis­tress to lit­i­gants and un­der­min­ing the pub­lic’s con­fi­dence in the ju­di­cial sys­tem.

Not­ing that the Do­mes­tic Vi­o­lence Act pro­vides that in­ter­im pro­tec­tion or­ders grant­ed ex parte shall not ex­ceed a pe­ri­od of 21 days un­less ex­tend­ed by the court, she said such or­ders are de­signed to pro­vide ur­gent and tem­po­rary re­lief to in­di­vid­u­als fac­ing im­mi­nent harm.