Justice centres bring free legal representation home

Rolex Opara lost her husband who was a civil servant about five years ago. Her co-wife went behind her back and processed the letters of administration to possess her late husband’s estate. Indeed Opara’s co-wife succeeded in getting the letters of administration.

But Opara’s friend told her about the free legal services provided by Justice Centres (Lira office) that she can make use of to get part of her late husband’s estate.

Indeed she contacted Justice Centres Uganda, Lira office and she was helped to get her share of her late husband’s estate.
Opara is one of the 150 vulnerable Ugandans who daily, approach each of the eight Justice Centre points seeking free legal services countrywide. This is because they cannot afford to hire legal services of a private lawyer.

Reports indicate that probably only about 16 per cent of the entire country has access to full-time legal representation by lawyers. This means about 84 per cent of the population in Uganda do not have adequate access to lawyers.

As such, they have to rely on other forms of assistance, for example the more than 50,000 local council courts.
A recent countrywide tour of Justice Centres Uganda, an initiative of Justice Law and Order Sector (JLOS); showed that majority of the Ugandans who seek free legal services are the elderly and the women.

Explaining why it’s mainly the elderly who seek free legal services, Justice John Eudes Keitirima, the resident judge Masaka High Court says it is obvious it is the old people who own property in our societies and in most cases seek courts to protect them.

“The elderly are the majority of the clients that Justice Centres receive because it’s the old that own property and the young just wait to inherit from them when they die…” says justice Keitirima.

Minimal presence

Despite this free legal aid project being scrambled for by many poor citizens, its presence in the country is very minimal. Poverty, ignorance of the law, the effect of armed conflict, disability or other vulnerability or marginalisation are some of the factors that undermine access to justice for the majority of Ugandans.

The provision of Legal Aid will greatly contribute to the empowerment of individuals and communities – a key ingredient of poverty reduction efforts thereby contributing to economic development.

Since the inception of Justice Centres about five years ago, the motive has been for Parliament to pass a policy that will see all vulnerable Ugandans access free legal aid and also have legal service providers regularised.

However, the Legal aid policy is still lying before cabinet three years later after it was tabled, a move that has seen the rights of vulnerable Ugandans being trampled upon since they cannot afford to hire the services of private lawyers to defend them.

Justice Keitirima explains, “I don’t see any justification why government has not passed the legal aid policy Bill. This is sitting on people’s rights. Any intervention that will help the majority of the poor population in accessing justice will be a good intervention…”

He adds: “the rich will always exploit a gap in the justice system to grab property of the poor.”
Justice Keitirima also observes that the delay in passing the legal aid policy is sign a of discrimination by government against the judiciary.

He explains that in each of the more than 120 districts in the country, there is a sitting Resident District Commissioner (RDC) and yet there are only about 10 Justice Centre points serving more than 100 districts.

In further explaining the challenges that the centres face; Jonathan Tyo, the centre manager of Justice Centres Hoima, says they are faced with limited office space from where they can effectively interact with their clients to express to them their issues.

“Because of the limited space we and being squeezed, some of the clients fear to reveal to us the challenges that they have come with on account that the other third party will hear their secrets,” says Tyo, adding: “We also face the challenge of staffing in comparison with the huge number of clients we get.”

What is Justice Centres Uganda all about?

Justice Centres Uganda (JCU) is a project of the government under the Justice Law and Order Sector (JLOS). This project started in December 2009 and was established and operationalised in the Judiciary. JCU is a one stop-shop legal aid clinic that seeks to bridge the gap between the supply and demand sides of justice.

This is done through the provision of a broad range of legal aid services to indigent and vulnerable persons in Uganda for free.
Focusing on cost efficiency, effectiveness, quality and outreaches, the services of Justice Centres Uganda cut across civil and criminal areas of justice. The Project aims at empowering individuals and communities to claim their rights and demand policy and social change.

About legal aid
Legal aid is the provision of free or subsidised legal services to mainly people who cannot afford the services of paid lawyers. The right to legal aid is well entrenched in the International and Regional Human Rights Treaty framework to most of which Uganda is a state party.

The provision of legal aid addresses the concerns of the poor and vulnerable by focusing on challenges arising from: affordability of user costs, lack of legal representation, and alienation due to technicalities, language and ignorance of legal rights.

Who qualifies for free legal aid representation?
During operations, JCU staff asks poor persons to apply and then screen them to determine whether they qualify for legal aid. It was agreed that poor persons would be selected by determining how much they earn to establish whether they can afford to pay for the service.

According to Ms Christine Birabwa Nsubuga, the national coordinator of Justice Centres Uganda, explains that in choosing a vulnerable client, they subject those who have applied to a test called ‘Means and Merits Test’ (MMT) to know who exactly qualifies.

Birabwa adds that this kind of test is where a staff from JCU listens to everybody that comes to the Centres and through an initial short interview to them, they are able to determine who qualifies and who doesn’t.

She further explains that if one is a widow or an orphan, their chances of being considered for free legal representation are high as this usually means that one is marginalised.

Museveni, Chief Justice take

It is upon this background that during last year’s third annual legal aid conference presided over by President Museveni, pledged to support the passing of the Legal aid policy when it comes to the floor of Parliament..

The President added that just like other government programmes that he has rolled out for all citizens like prosperity for all, UPE, USE, his next move is to roll out free legal policy so that the poor Ugandans can have free legal representation in court.
“The proposal for the national legal aid scheme is very welcome and is part of the NRM government cherished desires to restore the rule of law in Uganda after decades of misrule and extra judicial killings,” said President Museveni at the recent legal aid conference in Munyonyo, Kampala.

“The scheme will buttress our efforts to promote sustainable development, prosperity and enduring peace, provision of legal aid will take a program approach just like we addressed access to education beginning with Universal Primary Education and then Universal Secondary Education”

“There is need for a clear criteria for those to be supported targeting genuine poor and vulnerable who cannot afford legal representation..”

Chief Justice Bart Katureebe said there is need to have a national legal aid policy saying as it is now; the poor and the vulnerable find it an uphill task to win a case against a well-oiled and rich opponent who can afford the best lawyer in town.
“In as much as there is equality before the law, there exists unequal treatment in Uganda’s justice system. Legal aid is, therefore needed to reduce the inequality in the justice system.” said CJ Katureebe.

He added: “It is unacceptable that the rich, who can afford the services of the best lawyers, have more or less assured outcomes in court, while the reverse is true for the poor.”
“The poor are left to depend on the goodwill of the system, which as we know lacks the tools and resources to even meet minimum standards.”

Districts covered so far
Out of more than 120 districts in Uganda, its only seven districts that have justice centers where vulnerable people can access free legal services. They include; Kampala, Hoima, Masaka, Tororo, Lira and Fort portal.

The Constitution demands that every person is equal before the law and yet the right to legal representation is qualified by stating that it is at the accused ‘person’s own expense’ (Article 28(3(d)).

But if the Legal aid Policy is enacted, each district will have a justice centre to serve the locals for free.
At present there is no national legal aid scheme in Uganda for either criminal or civil cases, and there is only limited assistance to accused persons who are tried for capital offences appearing in the High Court.

Justification for the National Legal Aid Policy:
According to the National Legal Aid Policy 2012, draft that this newspaper has seen, a number of reasons have been advanced to justify why the Policy is important.

They include; bigger population is largely illiterate hence unable to read and understand their rights enshrined in the constitution, the need to extend legal services to the rural areas where most of the populace lives, need to have more people access the services of a lawyer whenever needed.

Others are; the need to address the inequalities in the justice system that are caused by the gap between the rich and the poor and the need to consolidate the laws that provide for the provision of legal aid.