Group Photo: Chief Magistrates after their meeting with the Chief Registrar
On Friday October 7,2022, the Chief Registrar, HW Sarah Langa Siu, held a meeting with Chief Magistrates at the Judiciary headquarters in Kampala.
The meeting was geared at sharing ideas on how to improve performance, tackle backlog as well as get updates on what is happening within the Judiciary.
At the meeting, different strategies were adopted to improve performance of the courts.
Key among these were for Chief Magistrates to embrace and implement "OBC" (Operation Backlog Clearance) with immediate effect and demolish the 11,000 backlogged cases in their docket.
It was also agreed that Chief Magistrates with capital cases categorized as backlog should compile lists of the cases and forward them to the Registrar, Magistrates' Affairs& Data Management by the end of this month.
For those with capital cases in which accused persons have clocked the period on remand warranting mandatory bail, lists of those cases should be compiled and forwarded to the Assistant/Deputy Registrar of the circuit or Division under which they fall, to be placed before a Judge.
The Chief Magistrates committed to study the draft instrument re-gazetting Courts and communicate to the Private Legal Secretary to the Chief Registrar, on the correctness of the proposed Magisterial areas by the end of this week.
It was agreed that the Chief Magistrates would submit data on the value of cases in Courts each month to the Registrar, Planning, Research & Development.
The Chief Magistrates were informed that they are required to submit clear and exhaustive work plans(for their entire Magisterial area) to the Registrar, Magistrates' Affairs& Data Management, copied to the Registrar, Planning, Research &Development between the 5th and 20th of October each year in time for the budgeting cycle of the next financial year.
The meeting agreed that Chief Magistrates yet to submit appraisal forms for the FY 2021/22 do so by close of business this week.
The Registrar, Planning, Research & Development, HW Flavia Nabakooza undertook to share a template of a work plan with Chief Magistrates.
Following a concern raised by the Inspector of Courts, HW Amos Kwizera, on handling of execution of execution matters, it was agreed that the Judicial Training Institute be notified to include training on executions in its training calendar.
Posted 7th, October 2022
