Rutashubanyuma
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- Sep 24, 2010
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Record 337 advocates join the bar
By ABDULWAKIL SAIBOKO, 17th December 2010 @ 13:00, Total Comments: 0, Hits: 61
THE Chief Justice, Augustino Ramadhani on Friday admitted some 337 advocates, a record number to be admitted since independence, saying that the advocate to customer ratio is still very low standing at 1:36,000.
The ratio of advocate to customers in other East African countries of Kenya and Uganda is 1:6000 and 1:3500 respectively. The admission of new advocates brings the number of registered advocates in the country to 1660.
When I took over office as the Chief Justice in 2007, I found a bundle of pending petitions for advocates. I promised to work hard and make sure that the number of approved advocates increases and we have managed to reduce it by far, but still much need to be done as some 1,130 applications are pending, he said.
The trend of admitted advocates since 2005 to last year has been 74, 93, 89, 121 and 55 respectively. This year alone some 271 were admitted in June and 337 others were admitted yesterday.
This is happening as the term of office for CJ ends on 28th of this month. The CJ noted that there were over 400 law graduates every year from universities around the country, calling for increased efforts by the judiciary to also increase the number of advocates admitted every year.
Some people think that more lawyers are becoming advocates because the quality of education has gone down, this is not the case. The education quality remains the same, but many universities now are producing lawyers, he said.
Justice Ramadhani further urged advocates in the country to extend their services to remotest areas of the country, saying that there were some regions in the country which did not have even a single lawyer, a situation that deprived legal services to people in those areas.
The Tanganyika Law Society (TLS) President, Mr Felix Kibodya commended the move by the judiciary to admit more advocates, saying that the trend needed to be boosted as competition within East Africa Community (EAC) countries was stiff.
Most of Tanzanians can not afford expenses that advocates require, I therefore call upon you to always be ready to volunteer in collaboration with TLS to provide free legal assistance to our poor people, he said.
Mr Kibodya also reminded the advocates of the importance of updating their skills in a bid to go hand in hand with this science and technology world. The Attorney General, Justice Frederick Werema welcomed the new advocates to the Bar and urged them to keep and maintain the highest standard of the Bar in the country.
You will soon assume the role of officers of the court. There are many roles of you as such but I think the major ones are simple. These are; a strong understanding of the legal doctrine and principles, a good sense of historical and social context and most importantly, a firm set of ethics, he noted.
By ABDULWAKIL SAIBOKO, 17th December 2010 @ 13:00, Total Comments: 0, Hits: 61
THE Chief Justice, Augustino Ramadhani on Friday admitted some 337 advocates, a record number to be admitted since independence, saying that the advocate to customer ratio is still very low standing at 1:36,000.
The ratio of advocate to customers in other East African countries of Kenya and Uganda is 1:6000 and 1:3500 respectively. The admission of new advocates brings the number of registered advocates in the country to 1660.
When I took over office as the Chief Justice in 2007, I found a bundle of pending petitions for advocates. I promised to work hard and make sure that the number of approved advocates increases and we have managed to reduce it by far, but still much need to be done as some 1,130 applications are pending, he said.
The trend of admitted advocates since 2005 to last year has been 74, 93, 89, 121 and 55 respectively. This year alone some 271 were admitted in June and 337 others were admitted yesterday.
This is happening as the term of office for CJ ends on 28th of this month. The CJ noted that there were over 400 law graduates every year from universities around the country, calling for increased efforts by the judiciary to also increase the number of advocates admitted every year.
Some people think that more lawyers are becoming advocates because the quality of education has gone down, this is not the case. The education quality remains the same, but many universities now are producing lawyers, he said.
Justice Ramadhani further urged advocates in the country to extend their services to remotest areas of the country, saying that there were some regions in the country which did not have even a single lawyer, a situation that deprived legal services to people in those areas.
The Tanganyika Law Society (TLS) President, Mr Felix Kibodya commended the move by the judiciary to admit more advocates, saying that the trend needed to be boosted as competition within East Africa Community (EAC) countries was stiff.
Most of Tanzanians can not afford expenses that advocates require, I therefore call upon you to always be ready to volunteer in collaboration with TLS to provide free legal assistance to our poor people, he said.
Mr Kibodya also reminded the advocates of the importance of updating their skills in a bid to go hand in hand with this science and technology world. The Attorney General, Justice Frederick Werema welcomed the new advocates to the Bar and urged them to keep and maintain the highest standard of the Bar in the country.
You will soon assume the role of officers of the court. There are many roles of you as such but I think the major ones are simple. These are; a strong understanding of the legal doctrine and principles, a good sense of historical and social context and most importantly, a firm set of ethics, he noted.