Faculty of Law
General Information
HISTORY
Since its establishment in 1968, the Faculty of has sought to provide quality education
in study of Law and Legal Sciences, and to promote the development of a well-rounded
scholar and advocate. Over the thirty years of its existence, the Faculty has expanded
tremendously. While the fast graduating class (1968-71) was made up of 17 male students
and 6 women, the Class of 1997- 2001 boasts a total of nearly 300, with a female
enrollment of nearly 40 percent Whereas the Faculty opened with only 6 teachers, today it
is made up of a teaching staff of over thirty, comprising 24 men and 8 women. All of them
are Ugandan academics who have distinguished themselves m their respective disciplines.
Commencing as a department in the faculty of Social Sciences, today the Faculty is divided
into four departments, viz., Law & Jurisprudence, Commercial Law, Public and
Comparative Law and the Human Rights & Peace Centre (HURIPEC). The education offered
by the Faculty today is extremely diverse. Not only is the regular (day) program growing
from strength to strength, but in 1993 the Faculty pioneered the introduction of Evening
classes - a practice that was quickly emulated throughout the university campus-
Postgraduate degrees are currently offered at the Masters (LL-M) and Doctorate (LL-D)
level, and both are attracting a considerable clientele.
The Faculty of Law is poised to enter the 21st Century as a trail-blazer in the arena of
legal teaching scholarship and practice, providing personnel for traditional law practice,
non-governmental service, international diplomacy and academia. Not only has it
strengthened the traditional areas of teaching such as Legal methods, Land law and Civil
Procedure, but it is introducing new areas that meet the challenges of the new millennium,
such as Legal informatics, Gender and the Law, and Clinical Legal Education. All these
developments have projected the Faculty back into the international arena, drawing student
app4cations from within the Greater Eastern Africa region, and further afield.
THE FACULTY OF LAW IN GENERAL
Makerere University has served as the traditional seat of academic excellence in
English speaking Africa. The Faculty of Law has opened its doors to students since 1968
and expanded to a current student body of over 650 students and 30 distinguished
faculties. The Faculty of Law has continuously adapted itself to suit diverse student
needs in a rapidly changing and growing regional economy. Makerere Faculty of Law
continues, each year, to attract some of the nation's best and maintains a diverse student
body with a greater degree of gender balance than any other professional school on the
campus.
At the undergraduate level, the Faculty of Law offers the 4-year undergraduate Bachelor of
Laws (LLB.) degree. This course is conducted simultaneously in the Full-time Day program
and Evening Program. Each of the two is specially suited for a different class of student,
the latter being tailored to professionals who want to deepen their knowledge of law- or
are called to the legal profession later in fife and is exclusively available to
self-sponsored students. The extension of the course to four years was intended to both
.0broaden and deepen the students' grasp of legal concepts and their relationship to other
disciplines. It also gives a much wider choice of subjects, particularly in the final year
of study. At the graduate level, the Faculty of Law offers the 2-year Master of Laws
(LL.M) degree and the Doctor of Laws (LL.D.). At the Master's level, there is no
specialization but the student has the choice to tailor his/her academic and professional
needs according to their interests. The Doctor of Laws generally follows the Doctor of
Philosophy structure and is similar in academic rigour.
THE FACULTY OF LAW
The history of legal education in Uganda can be traced to the early 1950s. In July
1952, the then Chief Secretary of the Protectorate Government issued a Gene "AFRICAN
PUPILS - CROWN LAW CHAMBERS". The General Notice read as follows: The ATTORNEY
GENERAI, with the consent of the Governor has expressed his readiness to accept African
pupils who are natives of Uganda in his Chambers in order to assist promising young men to
prepare themselves for a career in the Colonial Legal Service or for employment in
judicial and legal work with their African Local Government.
Pupils wishing to enter the Colonial Legal Service, unless already called to the Bar,
would during their pupilage have to study for their Bar examinations and would also after
their pupilage have to spend a period in Chambers in England. Detailed and suitable
arrangements would have to be in respect of each pupil. Pupils intending to return to
their local governments would have a shorter training but would be expected to pass
certain examinations. Again, suitable arrangements would be made in respect of each pupil
dependent on his previous experience and the employment likely to be offered him by his
government.
The Attorney General himself will select the pupils, who will work under him in exactly
the same manner as pupils working in banisters chambers in England. The Attorney General
will be entitled to terminate any arrangement made with a pupil at any time without
notice. No person will be A as a pupil unless he has a very high standard of education.
A date for interviewing candidates was set. Candidates were expected to start work in
January 1953. It is interesting to note that the Government did not think of introducing
the course for the degree of LL.B of the University of London as had already been done for
some other disciplines at Makerere. Pupils trained in the Attorney General'sChambers and
London was to qualify only as barristers-at-law. However, the scheme did not come into
operation
Legal practitioners continued to be wholly trained outside East Africa for the following
nine years: in the Inns-of Court in London, the King's Inns in Dublin, as barristers-as
law and in India as advocates. The first "natives of Uganda" to qualify as a
legal practitioner, Apollo Kironde, was called to Gray's Inn in London and then to the
Uganda bar on April 13, 1953. In Uganda, however, the name 'Advocate' was adopted for all
legal practitioners whether qualified in London, Dublin or India.
In October 1960, the Chancellor of Great Britain appointed a Committee on Legal Education
for students from Africa. Its terms of reference were wide: to consider what facilities
should be made available either in the United Kingdom or elsewhere, to ensure that members
of local Bars in Africa who trained in Britain possessed the knowledge and experience for
practice and to consider what assistance could be given in the establishment within Africa
of centers of legal education for local inhabitants. The committee's Report, better known
as the Denning report, (named after Lord Denning who was the chairman of the committee)
was presented to the Lord Chancellor in December 1960.
The Denning Report added momentum to the plans for the establishment of a University
College at Da-es-Salaam. It recommended, "Faculty of Law (which it proposed set up in
Tanganyika) should be started with all possible speed". In 1961, the University
College, Da-es salaam was founded with courses leading to the degree of LL.B of the
University of London. With the establishment of the University of East Africa, this
relationship with London stopped. Another avenue for qualifying as legal practitioner in
Uganda was thus created.
At the same time, the idea of training legal practitioners as barristers-at-law still
lingered on in Uganda. A Law School had been set up at Entebbe in 1961 for the purpose of
training magistrates of the then local courts who were not professionally qualified. In
1963, courses for Part of the English Bar examination were started at the school. Those
who passed Part I proceeded to London for the Final.
It was now felt that there was a need for an authority to be charged with policy matters
concerning legal education. Council of Legal Education composed of the Chief Justice, as
its Chairman, the Attorney General, the Dean of the Faculty of Law at Dar-es-Salaam and
two members nominated by the Law Society was therefore provided for in the Advocates
(Amendment) Act of 1963.
The Council was: -
- To exercise any power or perform any duty authorised or required by this or any other
law; and
- to exercise general supervision and control over legal education in Uganda for the
purpose of this Ordinance and to advise the Government in relation thereto.
A few years later, a decision was made to move the Law School from Entebbe to Kampala
because it was believed that the Law School was academically and professionally isolated
from the mainstream of events. The Uganda Government therefore proposed to transfer the
School to Kampala where it might be attached to Makerere University College and thus
enable students to have academic intercourse with other students and also to give them
more opportunities for mixing with members of the judiciary and the Bar. It was also
desired to have the school near the Attorney General's Chambers under which it fell for
administration. In being attached to Makerere, the Law School was, however, not to
immediately exist as a faculty of Law but rather as a nucleus for one, which was expected
if and when the university of East Africa came to an end. Makerere was to act as an
"Agent" for Government in running the school. The School was also to conduct
pre-enrollment courses for LL.B graduates from Dar-m-Salaam.
These proposals culminated in the establishment of a Department of Law in Faculty of
Social Sciences at Makerere University College in June 1968. In July 1968 the Law
Development Centre was established as a separate institution, to take over, inter alia,
the functions of the Law School at Entebbe, which ceased to exist. On July 1970, the
Department of law became a Faculty.
OBJECTIVES OF THE FACULTY OF LAW
The Faculty of Law has the following as its objectives:
- To educate Ugandan lawyers in their own country so that they are more familiar with Ugandan Law, the legal system and all the legal problems in their sociological, political, economic and general cultural context.
- To produce law graduates who are satisfactorily prepared for further training and grooming for professional practice that is of value and service to the people individually and to the country at large.
- To produce law graduates of the highest academic standing and caliber competent to execute all and any legal work in any capacity either as state Attorneys or as private legal practitioners of legal executive officers.
- To provide other University students and members of the public with the quality and quantity of legal knowledge and service required in their residence; and,
- To preserve and foster the traditional role of a university in propagating knowledge both within and outside the country of its setting.