Deputy Chief Justice Launches Training for Court Mediators in Arua

ARUA. Justice Richard Buteera, the Deputy Chief Justice of Uganda has officially launched the first lot of training for court annexed mediators in Arua city.

At least 33 mediators in the West Nile region are undergoing the two-day training that commenced at Hunters’ Nest Hotel in Arua city on Monday, October 28, 2024.

In his opening remarks, Justice Buteera who also doubles as the chairperson of Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) committee, said the purpose of promoting mediation is to ensure that justice is not delayed.

“Justice shall not be delayed. So, the purpose of mediation is for that objective, that justice shall not be delayed. We are trying to address the backlog, we are looking for methods to achieve this, one of the methods is mediation but the objective of it is that justice should not be delayed. So, mediations should not be delayed,” Justice Buteera emphasized.

He said that while meditating, reconciliation between the parties should also be promoted.

“What we are trying to do is to reconcile parties. Today, we are concerned with mediation. The Judiciary has been trying its best to promote mediation. So, what are we looking for in resolution of these disputes; we are looking for fair decisions and (speedy) expeditious disposal of what we do. Those are Constitutional obligations in the Judiciary that we want to work with you in resolving,” Justice Buteera remarked.

He said they have been wanting to see how fair and speedy decisions can be reached, adding that different tactics have been used to achieve that.

Justice Buteera also noted that the Constitution kept on referring to civil and criminal matters of which he said they are doing mediation in civil matters while the equivalent of it in criminal matters is plea bargaining.

“For criminal matters, people can do plea bargaining and their matter is resolved without going for a full trial and that is the alternative in respect of criminal matters, the alternative to full trials in respect of criminal trials,” Justice Buteera clarified.

He observed that on June 27, 2023, the judiciary launched an Alternative Justice Strategy (AJS) with the aim of trying to increase the application through AJS of the African traditional methods in settling disputes across the country.

“These are cheap, they are quick and acceptable means of settling disputes. In addition to mediation, we are also thinking that we can use you people in the areas such as local leaders to use traditional ways of settling disputes. We want to promote that, and we think it is useful. So, I wish to encourage our religious leaders, traditional leaders to promote mediation. We are all stakeholders in ensuring that our communities live in harmony,” Justice Buteera said.

“When we deliver justice using all these means, we shall help our communities to live in harmony. In addition to that, we are still struggling to promote mediation. Mediation will help us reduce backlog and help people to go back happy,” Justice Buteera stated.

According to Her Worship Sarah Langa Siu, the Chief Registrar of the Uganda Judiciary, they closed the month of September 2024 with 163,634 cases still waiting for resolution of which 40,965 are backlogs.

“So, it means we still have a problem and this high case load is against just a few judicial officers; 655 judicial officers are expected to resolve these thousands of cases. This only means that if we do not adopt mechanisms like ADR, like mediation, we who are Judicial officers we shall not manage and therefore, this is why it is important that we have these training. We give mediation the importance that it deserves, you get the necessary training so that you participate in helping to clear this case load that is still with the Judiciary,” Langa explained.

Similarly, Hon. Lady Justice Harriet Grace Magala, the Arua High Court Judge, encouraged the mediators undergoing training to take it seriously because mediation works.

In a pre-training press conference hosted by His Worship Paul Matyama, the Arua Chief Magistrate at Arua Court on Sunday, October 27, 2024, Her Worship, Zulaika Nanteza, the Deputy Registrar ADR Registry, observed that the categories of the mediators selected for the first phase of the training in Arua include; retired Judicial officers, two Bishops, a Reverend, a district Khadi, an RDC, Local Council One chairperson among others.

“Why we have done that selection is that we want to pick on different brands of people. A dispute will come to court when it is Church related, if we know that we have a mediator in Arua from the Church that we have trained, the Judicial officer will feel comfortable to divert that case from our system to the bishop to go and see how he can help it,” Nanteza cited as an example.

The two-days training organized by the Judiciary is being funded by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP).