Full face-lift or a complete revamp?
Well, come see for yourself: no longer will visitors to the FS Bar have to ‘sit up straight’, nervously staring at blank walls while waiting for that call into the dark recesses of ‘the advocate’s chambers’. And no longer will members have to desperately try to squeeze into the old tea room for functions and meetings. No, you really won’t recognize our sparkling new reception areas where you can now while away your wait by indulging, from the depth of genuine leather, in the luxury of being, until that call, a true ‘arm-chair critic’ in the face of the modern art works adorning the sleekly colour-coded walls. Not to mention, even, our sunny, spacious glass-and-leather tea-cum-arbitration room with its folding glass divider, and enough space to house every member of this Bar, and then some.
On Thursday 8 September 2011 we inaugurated that room with a farewell function for the second and third most senior judges from our Bar at the Free State High Court: Judges Callie Cillié and George Wright who joined the Bench in 1991.
Judge Cillié as a Matie alumnus, obtained his BA LLB from the Universityof Stellenboschin 1968, despite being one of Doc Craven’s blue-eyed rugby boys as well as a member of the Student Council. Armed with a Licensiaat Criminele Recht from the Universityof Gentin Belgiumin 1971, he returned to the Free Stateas a state advocate from 1971 to 1973. From December 1973 to 1990 he had a thriving practice at the Free State Bar, serving also as a member of the Bar Council. His retirement certainly won’t be idle: he has already launched with great enthusiasm into the full-time running of his well-known Sussexstud-farm outside Bloemfonteinand, just to keep really busy, has acquired a game farm at Mier in the pristine dunes of the Kalahari.
Judge Wright, born and bred a Capetonian, as a Kovsie alumnus obtained his BA LLB from the University of the Free State in 1965. From 1966 to 1980 he practiced as an attorney and later as partner at Naudé’s Attorneys in Bloemfontein. In December 1980 he joined the Free State Bar where he practiced until he joined the Bench in 1991. As an avid wild-life enthusiast he has spent countless holidays exploring every game reserve and wild-life sanctuary in the country. His other great passion is music: his truly awe-inspiring knowledge and collection of classical music is augmented by his having travelled the world to attend live musical performances that the rest of us can only dream of. Judge Wright is retiring to the scenic ‘Klein Karoo’ in full-time pursuit of one or both of his passions in between visits to his house at Little Brak River.
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