93. The Complainants have submitted that since learning of the first Complainant's exclusion from being considered as chief on the sole basis of her gender, she (Ms. Masupha) actively and diligently sought the assistance of the courts in Lesotho and has exhausted all the domestic legal remedies available to her to vindicate her right~_. 94. The Complainants have submitted that on 20 February 2009, Mr. Sempe Masupha, the younger brother of the late Chief Masupha, initiated proceedings in the Magistrates' Court for the district of Berea in Lesotho. He (Mr. Sempe Masupha) challenged Mr. Lepoqo Masupha' s appointment as Principal Chief and the appointment of the Acting Principal Chief on the grounds that important members of the family were excluded when the appointment was made and that Mr. Lepoqo was an "illegitimate" son of the Late Chief Masupha and could therefore not succeed him. They claim that Ms. Masupha was neither cited, nor given notice of this applic:ation. 95. The Complainants submit that after becoming aware of the proceedings in early 2010, Ms. Masupha applied to intervene as an interested party, but the Magistrate held th~t under Lesotho law, women had no direct and substantial interest in succession matters, which rendeted Ms. Masupha' s application for leave to intervene frivolous and unfit for adjudication. For those reasons, her application was dismissed. The Complainants have submitted that in April 2010, Mr. Sempe Ma1,upha's main application wa,s dismissed on the basis that it had not beertestablished that the appointments were made mala fide, illegally or in a biased manner. The Magistrates' Court held that the family had not deviated from the line of succession, from which it lacked the power to deviate unilaterally. 96. The Complainants have submitted' that on 14 April 2010, Ms. Masupha made a fresh application to the High·Court of Lesotho, exercising its jurisdiction as the Constitutional Court. She (Ms. Masupha) argued that section 10 of the Chieftainship Act does not, on a proper construction, preclude first-born female children of a chief from succession. Insofar as it could be interpreted to prohibit her from succession, she argued that the Chieftainship Act violated her rights to freedom from discrimination under section 18 of the Constitution of Lesotho and to equality before the law under section 19, but on 3rd March 2013, the Constitutional Court upheld section 10 of the Chieftainship Act.