Comesa says local courts obstacle to trade

The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa) Court of Justice has said businesspersons involved in international trade lose more time going to local court, which are obstacles to trade and commerce in the region.

Comesa said the businesses should instead go straight to the Comesa Court of Justice, which has few cases and deals with them speedily.

According to the immediate past principal judge of the Comesa Court of Justice, Samuel Rugege, who is also Rwanda’s chief justice, experience in the region has shown that the domestic processes are usually long and have lots of delays with backlogs of cases in the local courts which can take five to 10 years to be concluded.

He has, therefore, asked member States to do away with the clause on exhaustion of domestic remedies before taking the case to the Comesa court as it is affecting trade.

Speaking at a two-day Second Media Sensitisation Workshop on Competition Law in Livingstone, Zambia, Rugege said if a matter involves interpretation of the treaty and application of Comesa laws, businesspersons will be safe if they take it to Court.

“Although it applies to other international courts some courts, have abandoned it. The rationale behind it is that it is a domestic matter and judges in the country should be familiar with the problem and a matter of respect to the country. Therefore, it calls for individuals and companies to involve an international court if their country has failed,” Rugege said.