Nov 28, The Justice and Constitutional Affairs Minister Nobert Mao has pleaded with the House Committee on Legal and Parliamentary Affairs not to throw out the government’s proposal to increase the number of Justices of the Supreme Court from 11 to 21.
The Committee is scrutinizing the Judicature Act (Amendment) Bill, 2023, in which the government wants to increase the number of Justices of the Supreme Court to 21, including the Chief Justice, while the number of Justices of the Court of Appeal would increase from 15 to 55, including the Deputy Chief Justice.
While appearing before the Committee, Mao breathed a sigh of relief when the lawmakers informed him that they were in support of the proposed increment of Justices in the Court of Appeal, which also doubles as the Constitutional Court.
The Minister then made the case for the Supreme Court pleading that if the Committee is not in support of the proposed 21 Justices, at least it should allow the number to reach at least 15 Justices.
We have already accepted your position, and the reason we come to these committees is so that we can agree on what is in the interest of the nation. When you next see us, we shall have the real solutions. But we think that four additional Supreme Court Justices in the circumstances is fair, and we can manage it, pleased Mao.
He said that the reason the Judiciary is seeking more Justices in the Supreme Court and the Court of Appeal is to deal with the current case backlog and also to operationalize the regional benches for the Court of Appeal.
The Minister revealed that there is an “acute” case backlog in the upper bench, hence 45.35 per cent (303) case backlog in the Supreme Court and 59.6 per cent (5973 out of 8698) case backlog in the Court of Appeal as of April 2023.
This acute case backlog requires more manpower. The backlog in the Supreme Court is there with us, and the Supreme Court has not sat for a long time because their chambers collapsed. The number that we are proposing will allow the Chief Justice to have a court that is functional. We have justices who are on leave, those who are sick, and those who are busy writing judgements. So, an increased number will have the Court to continue sitting, he added.
Mao was responding to a lengthy submission by Bugweri County MP Abdul Katuntu, who said that the position of the Committee was against a bloated Supreme Court on grounds that the new Justices would help to ease the case backlog.
It was after Katuntu had started engaging the Minister on the challenges leading to backlog in the Judiciary as enumerated in a report of a Commission instituted within the Judiciary, that Mao requested that answers to those specific questions be given in camera. The press was then asked out of the Committee room by acting Chairperson Fox Odoi.
Katuntu’s take on Justices
Before the press was locked out of the Committee room, Katuntu had made his case against the bloating of the Supreme Court.
What we are currently having and even causing a backlog is every case ending up in the Supreme Court. If you institute many panels at the Supreme Court and they make two contradictory decisions, what will you do? We don’t need the numbers you want in the Supreme Court. We don’t need them technically. We may have a bloated House, we may have a bloated cabinet, we don’t need a bloated judiciary. Let us not dilute what the Supreme Court should be doing, stated Katuntu.
He added;
We are agreeable to the Court of Appeal. We agree that we need to regionalize the Court of Appeal. Now we go to the Supreme Court, we think it is a jurisprudential court supposed to set standards for both court of appeal and low courts. The Supreme Court can never be a trial court of facts.
Committee stance
While meeting with officials from the Judiciary, Law Development Centre (LDC) and Uganda Law Reform Commission (ULRC) over the Bill recently, the Committee raised a red flag on the proposal to bloat the Supreme Court.
As was the case of the meeting with the Minister, while meeting the Judiciary, LDC and the ULRC, it was again Katuntu who ran the show saying that though there was a Certificate of Financial Implication attached to the Bill, it would be costly to the taxpayer if the proposed increase of Supreme Court Justices is confirmed by Parliament.
Can we afford our Supreme Court to be bloated, really? The more judges you put there, you are going to increase inefficiency, they will not be effective. You are telling us to create a bill of $10M (UGX37.9Bn) annually, that is in the medium term. Oh dear, the taxpayer deserves better. Judges should be doing their job; they should be more efficient and more effective, said Katuntu.
He was responding to Sarah Langa, Chief Registrar at the Judiciary, who said that the increase of the number of Justices in the medium term would cost $10M, but this will go higher as all the regional court of appeals are established, a cost that Katuntu described as unsustainable for Uganda, given the pressing demands the country is struggling to fund.
In response, Katuntu said that there are other sectors of the economy that are not doing well because of meagre resources allocated to them, and there is no need to add more money to the Judiciary where things can be done differently and results are achieved.
Langa insisted that increasing the number of Justices in the two Courts would make it easy for the Judiciary to perform better, with the Supreme Court sitting in three panels at the same time for cases that require a full bench of seven Justices.
About the Court of Appeal, she informed the Committee that the increment in the number of Justices would see 15, including the Deputy Chief Justice, stay at the centre while 40 Justices would be deployed to the regional appeal Courts in Mbarara, Gulu, Mbale, Jinja, Arua, Fort Portal, Masaka and Soroti.
This will tremendously improve on the number of cases handled and completed by the three panels which will eliminate the case backlog. Increasing the number of justices of the Court of Appeal will ensure the operationalisation of the Eight regional Courts of Appeal. These will serve the people of Uganda better, and the cases will be concluded in a timely manner, she said.
Meanwhile, ULRC and LCD also backed the government’s proposal to increase the number of justices in both the Supreme Court and Court of Appeal.
Speaker Anita Among, informed the House that the report of the Committee will be presented on Wednesday at the second reading of the Bill with hope to be passed on the third reading.
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