By Mama A. Touray
Chairperson of the general legal council his lordship the honorable chief justice Hassan B. Jallow on Friday presided over the inauguration of the first ever office of the general legal council since its establishment.
In inaugurating the premises, the Honorable Chief Justice and chairperson of the general legal counsel underscored the importance of getting the infrastructure in place to enhance service delivery and sustain gains made by the Council over the years.
“It is important that the council as an independent body on cooperate legal body have its own separate premises and with the employment of permanent staff by the council, the council will be able to focus much more vigorously on the mandate it was registered.”
However, He added the issue of lack of premises over the past decades did not stop the council from underscoring its activities. Noting that, the council has made tremendous strive over the years as it has been overseeing the admission, and call to the bar of grandaunts from the law school and the enrollment of legal practitioners.
According to Honorable Chief Justice, since the establishment of the Law school in 2011, has graduated over four hundred lawyers and the training has been supervised by the general legal council.
For his part Salieu Taal president of the Gambia Bar Association said “I believe that we need all amendments to give the general legal council the autonomy and the means to operate an autonomous body, well resource, to discharge its functions in the education of lawyers as we need to do a lot to increase the quality of legal practitioners.”
Meanwhile, Registrar of the Ministry of Justice, Abdoulie Colley, said “The ministry of justice is committed to enhancing amendments as it is particularly important for the disciplinary committee which as we all know currently cannot sit or have forum.
“As a result we believe it is important to have an amendment to make it possible so that the backblock of disciplinary matter can fast-track and in accordance with the law, the Ministry of Justice will continue to play its role .