| Motto | A Tradition of Legal Excellence |
|---|---|
| Type | Public |
| Established | 1970 |
| Director | Frank Nigel Othembi |
Administrative staff | 50+ |
| Students | 2000+ [1] |
| Location | , 00°19′28″N32°34′07″E / 0.32444°N 32.56861°E Coordinates: 00°19′28″N32°34′07″E / 0.32444°N 32.56861°E |
| Campus | Urban |
| Website | www |
  Location in Kampala | |
The Law Development Centre (LDC) is an educational institution in Uganda for higher learning that offers various legal courses ranging from one month to one year. [2]
The LDC is the only institution in Uganda that offers the Bar Course leading to the award of the post-graduate Diploma in Legal Practice. In the early 2000s, the LDC was plagued by a high failure rate among students, as high as 90 percent in some years. The LDC, together with the Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs and the Uganda Law Society, have designed changes that include a pre-admission written examination for students, continuing education requirements for LDC lecturers, and instruction in teaching methods for all academic staff. The LDC library has also been updated with written literature as well as increased Internet access for students. [3]
The LDC is located on Makerere Hill along Gadafi Road, just outside the southern perimeter of the main campus of Makerere University. This is less than 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) south of the Faculty of Law at Makerere University and approximately 3.5 kilometres (2 mi), by road, north-west of Kampala's central business district. [4] The coordinates of the LDC campus are 0°19'28.0"N, 32°34'07.0"E (Latitude:0.324444; Longitude:32.568611). [5]
In 2018, the government of Uganda approved plans to establish regional campuses of the LDC in the Eastern Ugandan town of Mbale, Western Region, Mbarara and Northern Region, Lira. The Mbarara campus was established and operationalized effective in the 2018/2019 financial year. [6]
The LDC was established in 1970 by the Law Development Centre Act as a government-owned institution of higher learning responsible for "research, law reform, publications, law reporting and community legal services". LDC has a management committee that is responsible for policy formulation. Those policies are implemented by the director through various institutional departments. [2] The first director of the LDC was Kutlu Fuad. He was succeeded in 1972 by Francis Muzingu Ssekandi, who was later elevated to the High Court in 1974 and in 1978 to Uganda's first Court of Appeals, later renamed the Uganda Supreme Court. The current director is Frank Nigel Othembi. [7]
Administratively, the LDC is divided into the following departments: [8]
(a) Library Department (b) Library Publishers Department (c) Finance Department (d) Department of Research and Publications (e) Legal Education & Legal Aid (f) Department of Law Reporting (g) Department of Law
The current eligible Ugandan universities whose law students are allowed to join the LDC includes the following:
As of July 2014, the courses offered at the Law Development Centre included the following: core and major subjects are :Criminal Procedure, Civil Procedure, Commercial Law, Land Transaction Law, Domestic & Family Law. Other subjects include: Art of Advocacy, Judicial Conduct, Professional Ethics, Legislative Drafting & Accountancy for Lawyers. The center employs full-time academic staff and also uses the services of several visiting professionals and people with experience who are drawn from among a wide selection of members of the Ugandan professional legal community. [9]
Notable alumni include:
Makerere University, Kampala is Uganda's largest and oldest institution of higher learning, first established as a technical school in 1922. It became an independent national university in 1970. Today, Makerere University is composed of nine colleges and one school offering programmes for about 36,000 undergraduates and 4,000 postgraduates. The main administrative block was gutted by fire in September 2020 and the cause of the fire is yet to be established.
Makerere is a neighborhood in the city of Kampala, Uganda's capital city. The name also applies to the hill on which this neighborhood is perched; one of the original seven hills that constituted Kampala at the time of its founding, in the early 1900s.
Francis M. Ssekandi, is a lecturer in law at the Columbia Law School and, since 1 July 2007, a judge of the World Bank Administrative Tribunal. He has published on law and development, human rights and good governance. Ssekandi is a former judge in the High Court/Justice of Appeal (1972–1974) and a member of the Uganda Supreme Court (1974–1979).
Uganda Martyrs University (UMU) is a private University affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church in Uganda. The University is owned by the Episcopal Conference of the Catholic Bishops of Uganda. It is licensed by the Uganda National Council for Higher Education. UMU consists of seven Faculties, two Institute, six Campuses, nine Departments, and three schools. As of March 2022, total student enrollment is 4,632. Of these, about 1,500 students were residential, while nearly 3,000 students were enrolled in UMU's distance learning programs. The number of staff members was over 400.
Princess Kabakumba Labwoni Masiko is a Ugandan politician. She is the former Minister of the Presidency in the Ugandan Cabinet. She was appointed to that position on 27 May 2011. She replaced Beatrice Wabudeya who was dropped from the cabinet. In that capacity, she also served as Minister for Kampala Capital City Authority. She resigned from both of those positions on 14 December 2011, following allegations of abuse of office, theft by taking, causing monetary loss to the government and conspiracy to defraud government. She was also the elected Member of Parliament (MP) for "Bujenje County but lost the seat in 2016", Masindi District.
Uganda Management Institute (UMI) is a government-owned national center for training, research, and consultancy in the field of management and administration in Uganda. It is one of the nine public universities and degree-awarding institutions in the country outside the military.
Benjamin Josses Odoki was the tenth Chief Justice of Uganda from 2001 to 2013.
Makerere University Business School (MUBS) is the school of business of Makerere University, Uganda's oldest university. MUBS provides business and management education at the certificate, diploma, undergraduate and postgraduate levels.
Esther Mayambala Kisaakye is a Ugandan judge. She is a Justice of the Supreme Court of Uganda. She was appointed to that position in July 2009.
Makerere University College of Health Sciences (MakCHS) is a constituent college of Makerere University, Uganda's oldest university. The schools of the college offer undergraduate and postgraduate courses in the biomedical sciences, health sciences, human medicine and public health, covering a broad range of disciplines and specialties.
Jennifer Semakula Musisi is a Ugandan lawyer and public administrator. She is the first City Leader in Residence at Bloomberg Harvard City Leadership Initiative at the Ash Center of the Harvard Kennedy School, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. She was appointed to this position in January 2019.
Cavendish University Uganda (CUU) is licensed and accredited by the Uganda National Council for Higher Education (UNCHE), and was established in 2008. It is ranked 20th best university in Uganda and 10593th in the world.
General David Rubakuba Muhoozi is a Ugandan Military Officer and Lawyer. He currently serves as the Minister of State for Internal Affairs. He was appointed to that position on 6 June 2021, replacing Obiga Kania.
Professor John Ntambirweki was a lawyer, academic and academic administrator in Uganda, the third-largest economy in the East African Community. He was the current Vice Chancellor of Uganda Pentecostal University, a private university, which was accredited by the Uganda National Council for Higher Education in 2005.
Sylver Kyagulanyi is a Ugandan musician, music producer, songwriter and advocate. He is the director of Sikia Media Services. He has been one of the most successful songwriters in Uganda in the last ten years.
Esta Nambayo is a Ugandan lawyer and judge who was appointed to the High Court of Uganda on 4 October 2019.
Joyce Kavuma, is a Ugandan lawyer and judge on the High Court of Uganda. She was appointed to that court by president Yoweri Museveni, on 8 February 2018.
Shamim Malende, is a Ugandan lawyer, a commissioner for oaths, a notary public, politician and community activist. She is a member of the People Power, Our Power Movement and of the National Unity Platform (NUP) political party. She is the only woman on the legal team of Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu. In the 2021 general election she was elected to Parliament as the Women's Representative for Kampala District for the 2021-2026 term.
As of June 2020 there are eleven recognized universities in Uganda, that offer education in law. There is, in addition, one specialised school, the Law Development Centre, that teaches aspects of the law that the universities do not teach. The Centre prepares and tests candidates for the Uganda Bar Examination.
Flavian Zeija is a Ugandan lawyer, academic and judge, on the High Court of Uganda, who doubles as the country's Principal Judge, effective 25 December 2019. In Uganda, a Principal Judge is responsible for supervising the justices of the High Court, including the assignment of duties to members of the Court. The Principal Judge is also responsible for supervising the Magistrates Courts below the High Court.
