EAC judges call for a harmonised judiciary

By John Oyuke

Top judges of the East African Community (EAC) have called for punitive punishment for bad management and impunity.

At a two-day annual meeting held in Nairobi recently, Chief Justices from EAC partner States called for a stronger justice system to combat bad governance and promote rule of law in the region.

The judges made a raft of recommendations aimed at strengthening the administration of the judiciary including the ratification and domestication of relevant international laws dealing with impunity and human abuses and empowering regional and national judicial systems to handle these issues.

The judges urged the East African Council of Ministers to set up a unit within the Secretariat to co-ordinate the activities of the Chief Justices’ Forum and all issues related to good governance.

Judicial reforms

They also recommended studies regional legal systems and court structures to enable harmonisation given the divergence in Common and Civil Law applied in some partner States.

Augustino Ramadhani, Chief Justice of Tanzania and Chairperson of the Forum, said the initiative should be undertaken in collaboration with the EAC Judicial Training Committee.

The Deputy Secretary General of EAC in charge of Political Federation, Beatrice Kiraso, said the decision to institutionalise Chief Justices’ Forum would strengthen judicial systems in the region.

The recommendations by the judges come against a backdrop of rising concern among regional leaders and donors over slow judicial reforms and prosecution of corruption cases.

Speaker of the National Assembly Kenneth Marende last week decried the fact that sentences meted out in court are not enforced, saying failure to do so amounts to impunity.

"Kenya must move swiftly to ensure the law is enforced," he said when he opened the fourth national integrity review conference in Nairobi last Tuesday.

Marende said the law enforcement system in the country is lax and does not deter law offenders.

He questioned the rationale of meting out death sentences yet those convicted are not executed.

"For as long as the offence of robbery with violence and murder as presently constituted in our law books carry the death sentence in penalty, we have to implement the sentence," Marende said.

"If this is hard, then we should amend the law to reflect our present circumstances."

Addressing the media at the end of a visit to Kenya last month, World Bank Vice President for Africa Region Obiageli Ezekwesili described corruption and poverty as the twin enemies of development, saying they hamper local and international investment.

"The Government must create an environment that predictably sanctions bad behaviour to send an important signal to Kenyans and the international community that crime will be punished," she said on tour of the country.