Justice Without Borders: Great Lakes Lawyers Convene to Champion Regional Access to Justice

 

By Dr. Faith Odhiambo

Across the Great Lakes Region, access to justice remains one of the most urgent yet under-discussed issues of our time. While regional efforts have often focused on trade and infrastructure, a growing coalition of legal professionals is calling for justice to take center stage.

This week, under the banner of Uhaki Bila Mipaka – Swahili for Justice Without Borders – legal practitioners from across the Great Lakes convened for a Regional Workshop aimed at addressing one central question: How do we ensure that justice transcends borders and bureaucracy?

Organized in collaboration with International Alert, iPeace, the Pole Institute, and the Great Lakes Bar Association, the workshop provided a platform for cross-border dialogue on the legal needs of vulnerable populations – particularly those left behind by rigid national systems.

“Regional integration cannot just be about roads, railways, and revenues,” said one participant. “It must also be about rights.”

The workshop emphasized that institutions like the East African Court of Justice and the protocols of the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) provide a solid legal foundation. But more than treaties are needed. As one delegate noted: “Foundations need builders. That’s us.”

The discussions focused on the daily legal struggles faced by stateless children, detained refugees, and migrant women – individuals whose lives are often disrupted not by laws, but by the lack of access to them.

“The true test of any legal system,” said a panelist, “is not how it serves the powerful, but how it protects the powerless.”

Participants called for greater harmonization of legal aid frameworks, cross-border legal cooperation, and the establishment of mobile justice clinics to reach remote and marginalized communities.

As the region looks to deepen its integration, the message from the Uhaki Bila Mipaka workshop was clear: meaningful integration begins with justice that is accessible to all, regardless of which side of a border they call home.