By FAUSTINE KAPAMA-Judiciary, Dar es Salaam
THE Chief Justice of Tanzania, Hon. Prof. Ibrahim Hamis Juma has encouraged the use of technology and digitalization of court decisions in order to facilitate easy accessibility and preservation, thus enhancing delivery of justice and eliminate petty corruption.
Hon. Prof. Juma made such an appeal today dated September 18, 2024 at Slipway Hotel in Dar es Salaam when opening the TanzLII open access to law in Tanzania sustainability conference.
TanzLII is a legal research website of the Judiciary of Tanzania created to facilitate free and open access to the laws of Tanzania, a variety of Tanzanian legal materials, including case law from the courts of record, legislation and the Tanzania gazette.
“You remember in 1996 we had a commission to investigate the state of corruption in Tanzania. One of the areas which the report of the commission identifies where there was petty corruption is availability of court information…
“…Somebody will like to have a copy of judgment, he or she will be forced to give some money, petty corruption not grand corruption. Petty corruption affects ordinary citizen. Five shillings to get a copy of judgment even where somebody deserves was a lot of money. So, we thought that putting materials online is a way of fighting corruption,” he said.
The Chief Justice pointed out that one of the challenges that called for urgent attention when the Judiciary of Tanzania began to make reforms in 2016 was the lack of law reports and inaccessibility of statutes, High Court and Court of Appeal decisions.
Such reforms started to be implemented in the first five-year strategic plan, and the first phase of the Citizen-Centric Judicial Modernization and Justice Service Delivery Project.
Hon. Prof. Juma explained that the Judiciary of Tanzania appointed a team to benchmark and learn from other judiciaries how to make publicly available court decisions and revive the Tanzania Law Reports, last published in 2006.
“Visits and benchmarking began in June 2019, when the Judiciary appointed a team comprising select members of the Registered Trustees of Tanzania Law Reports, its Secretariat, and personnel drawn from the ICT Unit and Directorate of Case Management,” he said.
Such team, according to him, undertook a benchmarking and study visit to Namibia, Nigeria, and South Africa to equip members with skills to enable them timeously compile Law Reports that meet international standards.
He pointed out that the team learnt the standardized way of collecting, compiling, editing, and publishing other law reports and integrating the law reporting process in the country into existing technological platforms.
“In 2019, the Judiciary of Tanzania created TanzLII, a legal research website to facilitate free and open access to the laws of Tanzania, a variety of Tanzanian legal materials, including case law from the courts of record, legislation, and the Tanzania gazette,” the Chief Justice said.
Hon. Prof. Juma pointed out that TanzLII manifests how the Judiciary of Tanzania not only gives effect to the right of access to information, which the Constitution of Tanzania guarantees to the citizens, but it also implements the Access to Information Act, 2016.
“Since its establishment in 2019, TanzLII has made significant strides in ensuring that legal materials are accessible and transparent. In 2022, TanzLii had 469,052 visits and 699,378 in 2023. As of September 17, 024, TanzLii had 971,542 visits,” Hon. Prof. Juma said.
He explained that the platform's integration of the Tanzania Law Reports and its comprehensive database of over 50,000 judgments and 1,000 pieces of legislation have positioned TanzLII as an indispensable resource for legal professionals, judges, government officials and the public at large.
The Chief Justice also pointed out that AfricaLii has come out of its way to help TanzLII collect, digitize, and upload decisions dating back to 1980.
He said that since TanzLII is the only open-access website providing a complete collection of judgments and legislation from Tanzania, Judges, Magistrates, lawyers, law students, academic researchers and other users must also help to identify decisions that have not be uploaded.
Hon. Prof. Juma further recognized the continuous encouragement, support and mentorship TanzLII has so far received from AfricaLII, Faculty of Law University of Cape Town and Ms. Mariya Badeva, both in person and in her capacity as AfricaLII Director.
Speaking when welcoming the Chief Justice to officiate the conference, the Principal of the Institute for Judicial Administration Lushoto and Justice of Court of Appeal, Hon. Dr. Paul Kihwelo told the participants making law easily accessible was very crucial.
Justice Kihwelo stressed that there was no need of making decisions if decisions which judges are making are not accessible to the people because the access of justice is not only for someone to have access to the court of law.
“He should be able to go before the court of law and be able to address the court. You cannot address the court if you don’t know the decisions that are made by the court,” he said.
In her welcoming remarks, the East Africa Program Manager at Law Africa, Mrs Linda Amuor informed the participants that AfricanLII is an open-access research platform for African law jointly operated by the AfricanLII programme of the University of Cape Town and Laws Africa.
It is a project to support the establishment and operation of independent national Legal Information Institute projects in Africa. She said that the conference has been organised IGZ Rule of Law and Judiciary in Africa programme together with the African Legal Information Institute (AfricaLII).
According to her, the objective of the conference is to provide a sustainability of TanzLii and examine the current state of free access to law in Tanzania and identify the key challenges and opportunities.
She said that they would also use the two days of the conference to share best practices and lessons learnt from other regions, especially within Africa, develop sustainable strategies for the technological organization and funding aspects of legal information services.
On her part, Ms Katharina Kuehn from GIZ Tanzania and East Africa pointed out that access to information, laws and judgments is a very crucial in ensuring rule of law can be observed. She explained that digitalization is a true game changer as it helps to move from theoretical access to easier access.
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