Justice Herbert Ntabgoba: The man, pioneer and his blunt justice

When his career met its waterloo moment in 2004, Justice Jeremiah Herbert Ntabgoba who had headed the High Court as a Principal Judge for a record 15 years was faced with the same question that most retiring public officials fear to face: What next?

There were quite a number of possibilities: Could he just seat at home or open up his own law firm? Or could he go for judicial work in other jurisdictions like many of Uganda’s famous judges had done.

The answer to these questions came from one of Uganda’s leading law firms: Kampala Associated Advocates (KAA). The law firm’s founding partners wanted their junior lawyers to hold rehearsals in the presence of a judge, before they could actually confront one in an actual courtroom.

Candid, principled, abrasive and on top of that experienced in virgin but lucrative beats such as Intellectual Property (IP), senior partners at KAA with no hesitation came to the conclusion that Justice Ntabgoba had all the ingredients they needed to take the law firm to another level.

Indeed, Joseph Matsiko, KAA’s managing partner had only positive superlatives to describe the judge who had worked with the law firm from 2004 until last year, when he become too sick.
Blunt justice
In all the eulogies that swept in following his death on April 12, 2020, the main theme has been Justice Ntabgoba’s take no prisoners approach sometimes christened as telling it as it is when he was among those leading the judiciary.

While Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) founding President Dr Kiiza Besigye celebrated his courage and fair-mindedness, Yorokamu Bamwine who was recruited, as a High Court judge during Justice Ntabgoba’s tenure as Principal Judge in a phone interview described him as a straight forward person.

“I worked with him a lot when I was the Chief Registrar. What you saw is what you got. But he was also down to earth. He could talk to you and tell you what’s wrong. No beating around the bush,” said Bamwine who also served as Principal Judge for ten years.

Justice Ntabgoba’s approach of speaking truth to power was on public display in the late 1990s when he openly clashed with his boss – the Chief Justice Wako Wambuzi over a number of issues including corruption, harassment, witch hunt and interference, which forced the Inspector General of Government (IGG) and Uganda Law Society to intervene, but with limited success.
The two at one time exchanged words over a Pajero vehicle that Justice Ntabgoba felt Justice Wambuzi who was in his third stint as Chief Justice was illegally using.
Be that as it may, retired Supreme Court Judge Professor George Wilson Kanyeihamba, in his autobiography entitled The Blessings And Joy Of Being Who You Are gives a deeper extent to which the ruling oligarchy feared and hated Justice Ntabgoba’s guts.
In 1995, Justice Kanyeihamba who had served both as Minister of Commerce and the Attorney General in Museveni’s Cabinet submitted his application to the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) detailing how he deserved to sit at the Supreme Court- the highest in the land.
Shortly after interfacing with members of JSC who included Mr Bart Katureebe, the Attorney General of the time, Mr. Kanyeihamba wrote how he left Uganda for the United Kingdom where he had gone to visit his family.
On the same plane by chance he recalled how he met Mr Katureebe, the future Chief Justice and his wife who were heading to the same country for treatment.

While in the United Kingdom he decided to call Mr Katureebe who he had lectured law at Makerere University. He inquired about the fate of his job application. His former student delivered the bad news via phone.
“We decided not to appoint you as a judge on this occasion. There is a great deal of fear in the judiciary about your outspokenness on all matters judicial or otherwise. It was felt that we already have one controversial judge in the person of Herbert Ntabgoba, the Principal Judge. We cannot afford to have another one, especially in the Supreme Court.”
Going by Katureebe’s response, it was clear that the executive and some within the Judiciary had had quite enough of Ntabgoba’s rubble rousing style and they never wanted to add on another character in Mr Kanyeihamba but it was too little, too late. Kanyeihamba clinched the appointment.

Mr Katureebe’s fears that a combo of Ntabgoba and Kanyeihamba would be bad news for the establishment wasn’t farfetched after all.

Fighting for the institution
In 2001, for example, it became apparent the late Justice Leticia Mukasa Kikonyongo was to be appointed Deputy Chief Justice by President Museveni, following the retirement of Justice Seth Manyindo.

However, Ntabgoba and Kanyeihamba had different ideas: they mobilized other judges in a bid to reject Kikonyongo’s nomination on grounds that she was among other things, incompetent and thus she couldn’t be the head of the Court of Appeal, which doubles as the Constitutional Court.

“Suspicious and flawed” is how Justice Ntabgoba described Justice Kikonyongo’s nomination by the JSC before backing a letter which Justice Kanyeihamba who was the chairperson of the judiciary’s Ethics and Integrity committee had written to Museveni.

Therein Kanyeihamba, Ntabgoba and a number of senior judges asked the President to rescind the decision to appoint Kikonyongo as the second most powerful person in the judiciary, citing how she had purportedly mishandled a divorce case in 1990.

On January 8, 2001, Justice Ntabgoba, separately, wrote a letter to his boss Justice Benjamin Odoki accusing the late Joash Mayanja Nkangi then minister of Justice and Constitutional Affairs who wasn’t a member of the JSC of manipulating the commission into nominating Justice Kikonyongo.

“The JSC which is supposed to operate independently allowed itself to be influenced by the justice and constitutional affairs minister, Mayanja Nkangi, who does not sit on the Commission,” Justice Ntabgoba wrote.

Museveni snubbed all these warnings and pressed ahead to send Justice Kikonyogo‘s name to Parliament for approval making her the first female Deputy Chief Justice in Uganda’s history.

In his autobiography Kanyeihamba says that following this development many of judges who had penned signatures on the legendary letter turned against him.

One judge who had been with us all a long and who actually participated in the drafting of the letter and signed it before it was sent to the president denounced me and the action I took.

When asked to explain why he had signed it, the learned friend said that he had been hospitalized with malaria, I persuaded him to sign the letter which in his confusion he believed it was for another cause,” Kanyeihamba wrote at page 205 of his autobiography.

Whilst Kanyeihamba was forsaken by many he wrote in his book that despite their unsuccessful attempts to block Justice Kikonyogo’s appointment a number of what he termed as “principled judges” maintained their positions that Justice Kikonyongo didn’t deserve the position she got.

Justice Ntabgoba alongside the late Justices Alfred Karokora and John Wilson Natubbu Tsekooko are among those that held their ground.

Justices George Engwau and John Patrick Mashango Tabaro (who have since retired) together with Geoffrey Kiryawbire who is now at the Court of Appeal also supported Kanyeihamba throughout this very divisive process.

The fearless one
“He is the greatest Principal Judge Uganda has ever had,” Kanyeihamba said in the phone interview.

“He feared nobody and when it came to the law he was well versed with intellectual property. He was the best, I’m sad to hear about his death.”

Justice Ntabgabo’s knack of fearing nobody came to the fore in the early 2000s when General parts Uganda-owned by Haruna Ssemakula was dragged to court by North Agencies owned by Shukla Mukesh over piece of land found in Kampala in a case which is still ongoing today.

The first judge to handle the case was forced out of the case when Ssemakula told everybody who cared to listen how he had the backing of Museveni.

Justice Ntabgoba took over the case and immediately summoned then state house lawyers Hussein Kashillingi and Fox Odoi asking them if at all the President was intent on interfering with the course of justice.

From there onwards, Ssemakula stopped dragging Museveni’s name into the case.

Background
Born on July 21, 1939, to Zakayo Bakunzi Rugiriki and Maria Bakunzi
Nyirajana in the western district of Kisoro, Justice Ntabgoba graduated with a Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of East Africa, Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania in 1966 but his domain in Intellectual Property is written all over his Curriculum Vitae.

In 1976 he was certified in intellectual property from Australia before going on to serve as first Director-General of the African Regional Industrial Property Organization (ARIPO), based in Harare, Zimbabwe between June 1, 1981 and August 31, 1987, his CV says.

Between 1973 and 1978, Justice Ntabgoba served as Registrar General, Administrator General, Public Trustee, and Official Receiver of Government of Uganda, positions that possibly sharpened his skills in insolvency law.

Being appointed as Principal Judge in 1989 was historical in the sense that he was the first in Uganda’s history to hold a position which requires one to administratively lead all High court judges, registrars and magistrates – making it the biggest consistuency in the Judiciary.

His 2004 retirement having clocked the constitutionally laid age limit of 65 years in respect to High Court judges was in hindsight historical in nature because he was the last Principal Judge to Hear cases in Court Room.

Justice James Munange Ogoola, his successor concentrated on administrative assignments of the Principal Judge with many lawyers grumbling that he left a backlog of cases to a tune of 330 cases.

“Justice Ntabgoba was very hardworking. He managed to strike balance between hearing cases and administrative work of the judiciary. He provided leadership whenever he was called upon. I pray that God gives him a fair hearing,” Constitutional law giant Peter Walubiri said.

“He belongs to breed of fearless judges who came from Kigezi sub-region like me, retired Justice John Bosco Katutsi and the late Justice Gideon Tinyinondi, “Justice Kanyeihamba said in an effort to recap Justice Ntabgoba’s judicial career.

Intellectual property
In 1976 he was certified in intellectual property from Australia before going on to serve as first Director-General of the African Regional Industrial Property Organization (ARIPO), based in Harare, Zimbabwe between June 1, 1981 and August 31, 1987, his CV says.

The African ARIPO is an intergovernmental organization for cooperation among African states in patent and other intellectual property matters. Before his voyage into intangible property, the Justice Ntabgoba had served the government in myriad capacities.