BUJUMBURA September 6th (ABP) – The Organic Bill amending Law No. 1/08 of March 14, 2005 on the code of judicial organization and competence was analyzed during the Cabinet meeting of August 31 2022.
According to the press release from the General Secretariat of the State, despite the reforms of the organization and judicial competence carried out in 1987 and in 2005, the expected objectives for the advent of equal justice for all, closer to litigants, faster and more accessible have not all been achieved. Indeed, the analysis of the Burundian judicial organization reveals bottlenecks and blocking factors affecting the overall efficiency of the system.
That is why it appeared necessary to revise the Code of Judicial Organization and Jurisdiction to establish a modern and more efficient judicial system. The bill thus aims to bring Burundian legislation in this area up to the best international standards. While basing the development of the project in the wake of the provisions currently in force, it is added elements which tend either to modernize the organization of justice, or to facilitate its functioning. The project also aims to empower judges and make them more accountable.
The main innovations brought about by this bill are, among other things, the institution of a single judge in certain matters, so that the magistrate in charge of the case assumes and assumes his responsibilities in his decisions, the establishment of the dissenting opinion in case of disagreement occurring during the deliberation, the assignment of officers of the Public Prosecutor’s Office to the Courts of Residence, the increase in the value of the dispute with regard to the material jurisdiction of the Court of Residence in civil matters, with a view to bringing the justice to litigants and to adapt to the economic realities of the day, the restoration of the principle of the double degree of jurisdiction for disputes related to rural lands and the creation of a Court of Appeal of trade and commercial chambers in the high courts.
It is also about the reorganization of the administrative jurisdictions, by the creation of the specialized chambers within the Courts of Appeal and the Administrative Courts having two chambers, that of first degree and that of second degree which must know the appeal of the judgments rendered in administrative matters, the reconstitution of a judicial file, when, as a result of any cause whatsoever, minutes of judgments or judgments not yet executed, or proceedings in progress have been destroyed, removed or are lost .
After exchange and debate, the project was adopted with, among other recommendations, to carry the dissenting opinion of a judge in the same judgment or decision and not to append it in order to avoid its loss, to provide for an anti -corruption in the Intermediate Courts and appeal chambers in the Courts of Appeal, to insert a provision which indicates the relationship between the Council of village notables and the Court of Residence, to mention in the draft that the Courts and Courts must closely follow the trials in progress in the authorities which are hierarchically inferior to them to bring them to be more vigilant and to indicate in the draft the possibility of recourse to the Superior Council of the Judiciary and the authority responsible for in application of the decision of this Board, when it notes a misjudgment.