Technological innovations have been introduced in governance thus leading to e-governance. The story of ICTs and their growth is almost taken for granted yet it can be said its rapid penetration into all walks of life including judicial institutions was in certain cases, a matter of unintended consequences as the geek attempted many experiences with disparate demands.
It appears ICT is like the legendary folktales of throwing stones into a beehive. Sometimes the consequences of that act are good; in other cases organizations have been shut down with centuries’ work lost.
But just imagine if the original innovators did not make any attempt at all!
The East African Community (EAC) region has also embraced the technological innovations although not at the pace it is expected to be. Kenya is the East African ICT hub, with the country being a leader in broadband connectivity, general ICT infrastructure, value added services (VAS), mobile money and mobile banking and fintech services.
The country’s ICT sector is set to account for up to 7% of the country’s GDP through IT-enabled services. Internet access has continued to spur economic growth which contributed to the government’s development of the Digital Economy Blueprint, a framework to improve Kenya’s ability to leapfrog economic growth in the region.
In April 2022, the government of Kenya launched its ten-year Digital Masterplan 2022-2032, to align with global technological advancements and enhance the rise of Kenya’s digital economy.
The digital masterplan identifies four key pillars; digital infrastructure, digital services and data management, digital skills, and driving digital innovation for entrepreneurship. The government of Tanzania promulgated a National ICT Policy, 2003 to address the need for Tanzania to become a knowledge-based society, as well as the need to harmonize independent ICT -related initiatives that aimed at improving service delivery in all sectors.
This policy consists of ten pillars, one of which addresses the use of ICT within the public service to enhance service delivery to the general public. According to the 2020 UN E-Government Survey, Rwanda was particularly noted as a country that despite having poorly developed infrastructure, its online services are well developed compared to most other countries in Africa.
Rwanda’s good ranking is due to its efforts to develop and strengthen ICT infrastructure, well-managed public service portals, simple navigation, timely access to official information, regular online payments through mobile money transfer systems and improved government accountability.
In its third National Development Plan (NDP III) and Vision 2040, the government of Uganda incorporated ICT in its functions, management and administration. The focus of government is digital transformation, and not digital automation. It aims to increase access to ICT and provide universal and affordable access to the internet. The EAC also introduced the EAC Broadband and ICT Infrastructure Network to establish and operate a cross-border broadband infrastructure network within the community.
This involved the shift from analogue to digital broadcast migration (ADBM); development of a legal framework for cyber laws; development of ICT Policy and Harmonization framework; launching one network area, originally covering Rwanda, Kenya, Uganda and South Sudan.
The second African Judicial Dialogue Conference recommended incorporating technology in court processes in the regional, subregional, and national courts to enhance access to justice and facilitate judicial operations.
The use of ICT in developing countries judicial institutions improves the access and delivery of justice and reduces the cost of judicial procedures. The use of technology-based case management processes, including electronic case filing, mobile applications, and video conferencing technology to receive evidence and testimonies was emphasized in the said conference.
The RECs are regional groupings of African states, which have established regional courts with various jurisdictions and competencies over the years.
The regional courts include the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Community Court of Justice (ECCJ), the East African Court of Justice (EACJ), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) Court of Justice, and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Tribunal.
At the continental level, some of the established judicial institutions include the African Court on Human and People’s Rights, the Organization for the Harmonization of Business Laws, and the African Union Chambers from the trial of former Chadian dictator, Hissene Habre.
Following the digital migration, national courts within the EAC responded very fast to the digitisation of their court processes though some are too slow. Kenya was the first country to incorporate digitisation of its courts.
Kenya commissioned the Electronic Court Case Management System (ECCMS) on the 15th of January 2011 making it the first court to fully benefit from the merger of ICT and delivery of justice. Although Kenya appears to have been the first to launch the system, it was never effective until 2020 during and after Covid-19 pandemic where more emphasis is now on e-courts.
Rwanda followed Kenya to launch IECMIS on 31 December 2015. IECMIS in Rwanda integrated institutions of justice sector, that is; Judiciary, Ministry of Justice, National Public Prosecution Authority (NPPA), Criminal Investigation Department (Police) and Rwanda Correctional Services (RCS).
IECMS commenced business on 01 January 2016 in Kigali City Courts and all commercial courts totaling to 14. Rwanda’s system seems to have registered a lot of success in the region compared to other EAC states and on 02 March 2016, its Judiciary won the prestigious continental public management gold trophy for IECMS as the best demonstration of innovative public management in Africa.
The Judiciary in Uganda also responded to the NDP III and Vision 2040 by incorporating ICT in its functions, management and administration. On 01 March 2022, the Judiciary officially launched the ECCMIS as part of its efforts to achieve NDP III and Vision 2040 by embracing ICT and digitisation in adjudication processes.
Tanzania digitised its court processes last year in November 2021. The digital transformation in Tanzanian courts is aimed at increasing transparency, efficiency and speeding up the dispensation of justice in the country’s courts. There is no evidence of success of the system in Tanzania and the system seems not to have been fully operationalised.
EAC countries are, however, still grappling with the system due to, among others, low bandwidth, internet connectivity challenges, low power supply, ICT illiteracy challenges, mindset and attitude, among others.
In 2016, the EACJ established an ICT committee to spearhead all ICT initiatives. It thus started live-streaming its court sessions on its website. To further develop the ICT infrastructure, the ICT committee conducted benchmarking of national, regional and international courts.
At the national level, it covered the Rwandan, Kenyan and Ugandan judiciaries. At the international level, an international residual mechanism for Criminal Tribunals in Arusha, and at the regional level, the Abu Dhabi Global Market Courts and Dubai International Financial Centre Courts were studied.
At the recently concluded 2nd Annual EACJ Judicial Conference held between 26th and 28th October, 2022 at Kampala, Uganda, it was discussed that the strategy for digitizing court procedures considers four major areas, which are; the efficiency of judicial procedures, the increase of the level of transparency, the improvement of the level of information security, the integration of human capital, financial and material resources.
The perspectives of digitisation of the EACJ discussed include; electronic case filing, electronic case management system, electronic case record management system, electronic docketing and scheduling system (tracking) and courtroom technology.
The conference also identified a number of challenges encountered in the digitisation of EACJ. These include, inter alia, ICT infrastructure challenges, electric power supply, IT literacy challenges, organizational and structural challenges, policy challenges, standardization challenges and information security challenges, among others.
Despite the challenges associated with digitisation, the conference commended digitisation of court processes both at the EACJ and national court level of partner states given the relevance of digital transformation in the contemporary world.
Accordingly, the following recommendations were suggested; concentration should be on digital transformation, not automation, legislate data protection laws specifically for partner states lacking them and strengthen weaker ones, invest in IT infrastructure, build capacity and continuously train all the stakeholders.
The author is head, department of Law Reporting, Research and Law Reform, LDC and practising advocate of Courts of Judicature, Uganda and presenter on Modernisation of Courts using Digitisation in the 2nd Annual East African Court of Justice Judicial Conference.
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