Mediations

Just Before Opening Ceremony with Chief Justice Kavuma and Justices Kiggundu and Wangatusi

Like other African countries, Uganda has a lengthy history of resolving its disputes informally.  Before the arrival of the Brits in the 1860s and its subsequent colonization, Uganda didn’t have a formal justice system in the way that term is commonly understood.  Rather, the tribal leaders served as judge, jury, and (sometimes) executioner.  Conduct we would consider criminal either resulted in physical punishment, compensation, or even banishment from the tribe.

As a formal rule of law was established, cultural dispute resolution norms were replaced by “modern” means of delivering justice in both the civil and criminal context, at least in the urban areas.  Even after Uganda gained its independence from Britain in 1962, it retained the British common law system in its justice sector.  With the dawn of the 21^st century, however, Uganda began its rediscovery of alternative dispute resolution, beginning with a mediation pilot program in its Commercial Court.  Pepperdine Law School’s Straus Institute was instrumental in the expansion of this effort, providing training to more than a dozen Ugandan judges over a period of eight years.  Indeed, the first court-annexed mediator in the country, John Napier, was a recent graduate of the law school and dispute resolution program when he became a mediator here in 2009.

Justice Geoffrey Kirybwire (Justice K), Uganda’s designated liaison between the Ugandan Judiciary and Pepperdine, presided over the successful implementation of mediation in the Commercial Court while serving as the Head of that division.

Sunday morning, I attended All Saints Church with Justice K and his two children.  Once again, I stood out like the photographic negative of a fly in a bowl of milk.  And no, this was not because of my skin color, but rather because I have no rhythm.  Church in Uganda is a bit more, well, energetic than in the United States.  I am confident I provided more than a little comic relief for those sitting behind me.  On the good side of the ledger, the music and singing were so loud that I could fully utilize my lung capacity without shredding the ear drums of those around me.  I couldn’t even hear myself.

After church, I met up with Henry at a local mall for lunch and an update on his father, David, who is in dire need of a different form of mediation as his condition deteriorates in Mulago Hospital.  I have forwarded portions of David’s medical charts to doctors in the United States and they have impressed upon me the critical nature of his current condition.  I visited David in the late afternoon and even I could tell he was worse off than the day before.  As of Sunday evening, the private doctor who was attending to David at this public hospital remained unwilling to operate unless and until his condition stabilized – surgery is impossible until he is stabilized, but it seems as if the only thing that can stabilize him is surgery.

Late Sunday night, the Pepperdine mediation team returned from their African Safari and Nile River cruise exhausted, but glad they had taken the trip.  We finalized plans for Monday’s conference over dinner.

On Monday morning, Uganda formally launched an expansion of mediation into the other three civil divisions at the trial court level.  Fittingly, Pepperdine was in the middle of it.  While incongruous in one level (I am not trained in mediation techniques), I was honored to be the Pepperdine representative for this occasion.

As per usual, the gathering started about an hour late.  In attendance were fifty Ugandan judges and fifty Ugandan lawyers.  Among the judiciary were one Justice from the Supreme Court, seven Justices from the Court of Appeals, and twenty-one Justices from the High Court (trial level).  About twenty Magistrates and Registrars were also in attendance.

After two welcoming speeches from the high court judges who convened this gathering from the Ugandan side, I was invited to the podium to say a few words and to introduce the four mediation trainers who would be presiding over the five-day program.  I took the opportunity to congratulate and encourage them as they embraced civil mediation for the entire country in an effort to greatly reduce the case backlog in their courts.  The Chief Justice of Uganda spoke next and lavished thanksgiving on Pepperdine for its long-standing and transformative service to Uganda’s judiciary and its people.  It was a proud moment for our school.

As the media-rich opening of the program came to a close, we divided the Ugandans into two separate rooms – judges in one, lawyers in the other.  During this transition, we broke for tea and took some pictures.  Several of our team were photographed while engaged in a side conversation with the Chief Justice, which ran in Tuesday morning’s paper.

http://www.monitor.co.ug/News/National/All-civil-disputes-set-for-mediation–judiciary-says/-/688334/2238594/-/rurny1/-/index.html

Good thing I have such a huge forehead, or I would have missed my opportunity for this photo op.  Also pictured with the Chief Justice are Professors Stephanie Bell and Denise Madigan, along with Judge Paul Beeman.  Just off camera was Judge Mitch Goldberg.

As the day unfolded, I drifted in and out of the two training rooms (the participants were fully engaged), even while David drifted in and out of consciousness.  In the late afternoon, the private doctor told Henry that David’s chances of survival were 50/50, and that prayers were his best hope.  More mediation on David’s behalf would be greatly appreciated.

In the early evening, however, a team of doctors and medical students from Makerere University arrived at David’s side and have apparently decided to use his case as a training exercise for the students.  This, in and of itself, felt like an answered prayer.

Henry and I discussed in depth the options – I was leaning toward trying to move David to a private hospital, perhaps in Nairobi, Kenya, but Henry is convinced that his best chance for survival is to remain with this medical team that has now replaced the private doctor.  Practical wisdom is playing hide and seek with me now.

In the late evening, Henry’s mother arrived at the hospital to help take care of David.  Now that he is no longer ambulatory, an additional layer of responsibility exists, including those related to bodily fluids that Henry’s mother has insisted on handling.

Henry joined me at my hotel late Monday night and will venture back to Hoima on Tuesday morning to ensure his brother Joseph is settled into the school he began attending on Monday.  Henry will return to Kampala on Wednesday.

Judge Beeman and Professor Bell Training the Judges