Our Program

Why Kampala? For the past week, I’ve been here teaching at the International Law Institute (the ILI). The ILI began in Washington DC back in the 50s. Part of the goal originally was to assist Germany in rebuilding its legal system after the war. Eventually, they decided to branch out, and about fifteen years ago, began the ILI of Uganda. It is now also known as the African Center For Legal Excellence.

The ILI reminds me a lot of the State Bar function of providing continuing education for lawyers, but the ILI does even more. The ILI offers not only week-long or two-week-long courses such as the one I’ve been here teaching, but it also offers diploma courses that can run for as long as three months.

The course I've been teaching (along with my colleague Mimi) lasted just one week (although one participant today asked if we could stay and extend the program another week), and we had lawyers from several countries who came to attend the course: six from Uganda, two from Rwanda, one from Malawi, one from Tanzania, and one from Nigeria. Working with these attorneys has been incredibly fulfilling—enriching, even. Sure, I’m the one here to teach them, but I’ve learned so much from them as well.

Here we all are--Mimi and me, the participants, and the ILI staff involved in our program.



Five of our Ugandan participants work for the Ministry of Justice here in Kampala. The Ministry acts much like our state bars; it serves as the disciplinary authority over attorneys here. Clients can submit complaints about lawyers’ practice to the ILI, and the ILI staff attorneys (which is what our participants are), notify the attorney of the complaint and sometimes have to prosecute the complaint.

Our other Ugandan participant was our oldest participant. He works in private practice, and he is partner in his law firm. He is quite fascinating. His wife is a judge here, and his children, all in school in Australia, have quite impressive careers---one is a biomedical engineer, two others are other types of engineers, and, he told us with a grin, the other is a fashion designer. This participant obviously read a lot and paid a lot of attention to goings on elsewhere; he made a very clever joke one day by referencing the lyrics to Hotel California, but he did have to ask me what, exactly, was a “soccer mom.”

The two participant from Rwanda were a bit more difficult to get to know. The gentleman, who works for the Rwanda Tea Authority, was quiet, and I got the impression his mind wasn’t totally plugged into our program. The female (who worked for a bank) spoke French as her first language, and although she could speak English very well, she had a difficult time understanding it. I’m sure it was quite exhausting for her each day to have to listen and translate what Mimi and I were saying, especially with our American accents.

The Malawian was likewise quiet. He was very sweet, but just quiet and a bit shy. He works as a prosecutor for the Malawi Anti-Corruption Bureau. He was very bright, just quiet.

Finally, the Nigerian, well, he was quite a character—a great one, but one nonetheless. We were a bit worried at first, because he was “sent” to our course by his employers based on some problems that had come out in his writing—problems that cost the private firm he works for, or perhaps it’s client, a great deal of money. He spoke much more loudly than anyone else, and he seemed to have a strong ego. But our worries were needless. He wasn’t pompous or deeply arrogant; he was just Nigerian.

I’ve learned that, as a Kenyan told me over lunch one on Friday, in general, East Africans are relatively quiet and reserved. The loudest among them are the Kenyans, but the Tanzanians and Ugandans are all very quiet. West Africans, on the other hand, are generally loud, emotive, and animated. Thus, if you put one Nigerian in a room full of East Africans, he will stand out distinctly

Most of the group was in their late twenties or early thirties, with the majority of them married. Most found it quite odd that neither Mimi nor I had children. Actually, it was a bigger concern that I’d not had children than that I’d never married; in fact, no one asked me about a husband. Hilda, one of the participants, pulled me aside before the end of the program on the last day and told me I really should have children. She said, “Who will you leave your legacy to? Your money and things?” I told her about my nieces and assured her I’d be happy to leave it to them, provided, of course, they held up the promise to be good to me in my old age. ;-) I added that by me not having children, it sure did make it easier to travel to Africa for two weeks. Hilda was please with that, and agreed that being able to up and travel without concern for kids was a benefit of not having any.

The ILI is in an old colonial house not too far from the Mosa Courts or the city. The first thign you notice upon getting out of the car at the ILI is the smell. The air is filled with the smell of flowers--something similar to a gardenia, I believe. The ILI is, I suppose, about a five minute drive in the city. Our classroom was on the top floor, essentially in a room built on top of the roof. we had our tea breaks each morning under two canopies atop the roof, and we ate lunches htere as well. Here are two views from the rooftop (it's only about two stories tall), showing the incredible sights.