By Mulengera ReportersChief Justice Alfonse Owinyi-Dollo says that he intends to keep praying to God while engaging in healthy living lifestyles so as to prolong his stay on earth. He is certain he won’t be dying soon because there is a lot more that his creator wants him to accomplish for humanity.
Dollo says that the long life, he is certain God will be bestowing upon him, will enable him see many of his enemies and haters (including some leaders of the current Uganda Law Society) fail or die by their own sword.
The Chief Justice says that during that long life he will also be able to see a better-funded Judiciary arm of government. He says that he has worked hard to see the Judiciary growing its funding from the consolidated fund to the level of Parliament and the Executive arm of government.
He thanks the President for doing his best to grow the amount of financial resources annually coming to the Judiciary, as was envisaged under the newly enacted Administration of the Judiciary Act.
Dollo says that the enhanced funding has enabled him do and perform much better than any of his predecessors and thereby being able to recruit more judicial officers and enumerate them better. Even automation and digitization of Judiciary services delivery processes has been enabled because of increased funding, for which Dollo says Gen Museveni deserves all the credit because he has personally been very supportive.
However, as he prepares to hang his boots and retire to go run his charity foundation at the beginning of next year, CJ Dollo says that he is hurt to see the radical line the current Uganda law society leadership has taken. That he knows what the ULS leadership ideally ought to do and prioritize because he himself was a member of the ULS’s executive committee long before current Society President Isaac Ssemakadde was born.
He notes that it’s regrettable to see the “foul-mouthed” ULS President Isaac Ssemakadde lead the attack and abusive campaign targeting judicial officers yet, ideally, ULS is supposed to be the biggest defender of the bench.
Dollo says that every reasonable lawyer should be interested in a strong Judiciary which is respected and believed by the populace because when the Judiciary gets destroyed, even lawyers won’t have where to work from.
He says there is a lot the judiciary and bench members can collectively do to cripple and complicate the economical survival of lawyers. He adds that he doesn’t want to escalate things to the level of having to crack the whip on Isaac Ssemakadde and other ULS members.
He is angry as to why Ssemakadde, who he says is a foul-mouthed young man, had to say all those nasty things against the person of Justice Musa Sekaana.
Dollo says ULS members must prevail on Ssemakadde to apologize because escalation will end in tears for the ULS leadership and membership. He says the door is open for Ssemakadde and his ilk to consider coming out to publicly apologize.
Upon being blocked from talking at the Friday new law year event at the High Court grounds, Ssemakadde walked over to Dollo to register his aggrievement and when Dollo disregarded and lambasted him, Ssemakadde led his members to walk out on the CJ in the presence of Minister Norbert Mao and Prime Minister Robinah Nabbanja among other dignitaries.
Dollo says that the bench members he leads are prepared to tolerate being positively criticised but not by way of vulgar words, similar to what Ssemakadde directed at Justice Musa Sekaana. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
