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Auxilia Katongomara, Chronicle Reporter
THE Law Society of Zimbabwe issued a total of 1 746 practising certificates in the first nine months of this year amid concerns of quality offered by local universities due to the high enrolment figures.

LSZ president, Mr Misheck Hogwe, in his annual report, said high enrolment rates by universities could affect the quality of the law qualification.

“The quality of the LLB degree is adversely affected by the large numbers enrolled without references to resource and capacity constraints to implement effective post academic professional training that is required by law,” he said.

In the report, the outgoing LSZ president said during the course of the year, the LSZ held an Indaba with tertiary institutions, Council for Legal Education (CLE), Ministry of Justice and Parliamentary Affairs and the International Commission for Jurists where issues relating to legal education were raised.

CLE undertook to make conversion examinations for those who studied law outside the country affordable.

“The entry requirements and selection of the LLB degrees were discussed and it was proposed that Deans of Law faculties should engage and explore how universities could align and develop comparable benchmarks on admission requirements. It was agreed that such additional requirements should not be exclusionary, undermining the right to education of prospective LLB applicants,” said Mr Hogwe.

He said the Society continues to effectively play its licensing function through timeous processing of Practising Certificates and registration of new members.

“A total of 1 746 practicing certificates were issued between January and September 2018. A total of 32 new law firms were opened between January and October 2018 and there were some out of the 32 that closed their branch operations owing to viability challenges among other reasons,” said Mr Hogwe.

He said the Society also responded to other emerging issues such as Legal Aid Societies or companies and debt collectors.

Mr Hogwe said this was done through litigation and engaging other strategic institutions such as police, prosecution and the Insurance and Pensions Commission (IPEC) among others.

The LSZ president said cases of indiscipline have remained a key issue in almost all the annual reports of the Society with most of them associated with the handling of Trust Funds despite the associations’ wide publication of deregistration.

“Members continue to engage in abuse of trust funds and the Society has taken a firm stance on all the cases involving abuse of trust funds as a way of addressing the principle that members should never abuse trust funds despite amounts involved,” he said.

Mr Hogwe said other cases of indiscipline include failure to respond to correspondence, failure to render an account to client for work done and failure to appear in court.

“There is a rising number of cases being referred to the Law Society by the courts, fellow members and professions. Council has thus responded to these threats through its Disciplinary and Ethics committee that has recommended various sentences from fines to de-registration,” he said.

– @AuxiliaK