“OPERATIONALIZE MOYO, NEBBI HIGH COURTS,” ULS CHAPTER WEST NILE APPEALS

By Morish Dramadri

Arua city

Legal advocates in West Nile have called on the government to operationalize the two proposed high court circuits of Moyo and Nebbi, in order to curtail the mass congestion in Arua main prison caused as a result of huge case back locks.

Arua main men prison as of Monday March 17, 2025 had a total of 1,206 of which only 483 are convicts and 723 remands. This is against the prison’s capacity of holding 200 people.

Equally at Arua women prison which has a capacity of 24 inmates, there are 53 convicts and 43 remands most of which are committals awaiting the high court.

Counsel Onenchan Ronald the Vice president of Uganda Law Society chapter West Nile while speaking the high court open day in Arua city on Tuesday believed that operationalizing the two high court circuits will help reduce the burden on the litigants.

“Resident judge is doing what it takes to reduce the backlog, West Nile has been designated with three circuits two of which are high court and court of appeal, the one in Nebbi and the one in Moyo to reduce the work load on the resident judge of Arua high court circuit and to reduce the pressure on the litigants, we put our request that operationalize those two high court circuits,” Onenchan requested.

Arua high court currently serves the 13 districts and 1 city in the region of West Nile by only one resident high court judge.

Arua resident high court judge Her Worship Grace Harriet Magala equally reiterated that the operationalization of Moyo and Nebbi high courts would help reduce the delay of justice to the citizens in the region.

“The people in the region have difficulty in accessing justice especially those that come from far places, part of the reason some matter are delayed is that some witnesses you get feedback that they were unable to get transport to come, the distances are long and it demands a lot, so funds allowing the high court of Moyo should be operationalized and that of Nebbi as well,” HW. Magala emphasized.

In response the Deputy Chief Justice designate of Uganda Justice Flavian Zeija assured, “we are supposed to operationalize one of the courts but again we got a challenge one of the judges was appointed to the judicial service commission and again two judges are retiring, so when they are replaced in few months’ time, am going to operationalize Moyo,” Justice Flavian echoed.

Arua high court as of Monday had a total of 596 criminal matter cases with 74 back locks, 607 civil matters of which back lock is 298.