THE Judiciary of Tanzania has formed a sub-committee to review and analyse the Presidential Criminal Justice Commission’s report to determine all areas that need to be implemented in the whole context of providing justice to the people.
This was revealed by the Chief Justice, Prof Ibrahim Juma after swearing in 38 new Resident Magistrates at an event held at the High Court of Tanzania in Dar es Salaam.
“I would like to congratulate the committee led by Court of Appeal Justice, Dr Gerald Ndika. They have reviewed the report, analysed and classified the areas related to the Judiciary. Our committee has identified 18 areas that involve the Judiciary of Tanzania.
“We wanted to identify areas in the report that need direct attention of the Judiciary. We also wanted to know the recommendations that the presidential commission made about the judiciary, what advice have the committee members given about the judiciary and what are the things that we need to implement,” he said.
Similarly, the Chief Justice said the committee identified and analysed areas that the Presidential Commission had earmarked in order to improve the performance of Criminal Justice Institutions, especially those that touch the Judiciary.
“Therefore, our Judiciary Committee identified areas that affect other institutions, including the judiciary. So, we also have to prepare ourselves to work on those areas since the implementation of the Criminal Justice Commission report does not need to wait,” Prof Juma urged.
He directed the judges, magistrates and court administrators to study the areas that the committee identified so that the judiciary could start taking action. He said the area that needs immediate implementation are those that do not require funding or discussions in meetings.
“The President’s Commission learnt that we had forgotten our legal obligations. Therefore, what it did was just to remind us to implement the existing laws, especially on matters that do not need budget or decisions that result from meetings,” the Chief Justice said.
Giving an example on the area that touches magistrates, the CJ hinted that the Presidential Commission recommended that the law be amended to give the Court authority to consider the time that the accused stays in remand during the issuance of the sentence.
“You know our cases take long time, when a person is arrested, they stay in remand for some time and very unfortunately such time is not considered in the sentence handed after the completion of the trial.
“The Commission has reminded us that Section 172 (2) © of the Criminal Procedure Act requires the court to deduct the time the suspect or prisoner spends in prison in the final verdict, ” the Chief Justice said.
Prof Juma said that they will monitor the statistics to see how well the magistrates are implementing the commission’s proposals, saying the practice of considering time spent in remand by court when handing sentences does not need time wasting. According to the CJ, the implementation of the matter, in fact, should have started yesterday.
He appealed to the magistrates to consider the importance of implementing all the committee recommendations which do not require amendment of laws.
The CJ spoke on the weakness noted in the imposition of alternative sentences that is provided under the law as the area that is directly enforceable.
He pointed out that there has been overuse of provision of custodian sentences, thus the Presidential Commission issued a reminder to magistrates, requiring them to give alternative punishments.
“You know, people sometimes like to see an accused person goes to prison, but as your oath says, you are not supposed to listen to such complaints. What you are required to do is to follow the rules and procedures, according to your oaths,” Prof Juma said.
He therefore urged the magistrates to refrain from resorting to order convicts to go to prisons, asking them to use the law by giving alternative punishments. He said ordering convicts to go to prisons has been causing congestion in correctional facilities, a situation that causes the public and other stakeholders to apportion blame to judiciary.
The Judiciary of Tanzania is one of the institutions that are required to implement the recommendations of the President’s Commission designed to look at how to improve the performance of Criminal Justice institutions in the country.
