INTRODUCTION
Despite
law clubs and their activities being of good help for a law student, there is
one thing which is of paramount importance in shaping quickly a law student
into future trained and qualified lawyer is ‘Moot Court Competitions’ that each
law students ought to take part in.
What is
moot court?
Usually,
Moot court is a fictitious court at which competing law students present their
point of view on narrative cases for training. It is a supplementary activity
at numerous law schools in which participants take part in replicated court
proceedings, which usually involves drafting briefs or memorials for both the
sides claimants/appellants/petitioners and the respondents, and participating
in oral arguments presented before the panel of judges.
At these
events, students from various law schools play the role of legal counsels in a
case problem given comprised of real-life legal issues in a simulated court
before Judges with expertise in the relevant area of law. A significant factor,
each of the participating team must make sure that it does its best while
acting for both claimant and respondent sides.
How are
moot court competition organized?
Each Participating University sends its representing team
consisted of Eight (8) students, preferably four (4) men, and four (4) women.
Among the eight (8) members, four (4) constituted the pleading team while four
(4) others had to act as a back-up team to support the pleading team with
notes, references, etc. Each team must be
accompanied by a coach who is an academic staff and whose research focus area
is in the relevant field of law.
The
over-all purpose of the Competition is to expand and fortify law students’
expertise and understanding of exact matters connected to countrywide laws.
Precisely, the purposes of the Competition are:
1. To improve law students’
knowledge and analytical, research, writing, and oral skills;
2. To raise awareness on
main legal issues faced by citizens in relation to most used laws and
procedures in their respective countries;
3. To highpoint key values
and human rights protected in utmost used laws in a particular country;
4. To disseminate relevant
leading cases decided by a particular country’s courts in relation to most used
laws;
5. To create a network of
law students, lecturers, lawyers and judges interested specific fields of law.
On the day of competition, the competitors sit facing each other on opposite sides
judges being in-between them as referees. Likewise, when the competition
begins, each team from one university competes with another team from another
university.
This competition
includes various activities that are conducted by law students in their
preparations for mooting. Moreover, students who participate in this moot court
competition possess only theoretical knowledge. They participate in this
competition when having completed all the relevant law modules including
procedural laws, writing, and pleading skills taught to every law student at any
university. On the contrary, they don’t know how to put that knowledge and skills
to the test until when they participate in the National moot court
competitions.
Moreover,
after the participants receive the case problem for the National Moot Court
Competition from the iPeace. University participating teams meet on a regular basis
and work together to discuss the case problem given, research and write both
memorials on the applicants and the respondents for the case thereon basing on
the existing legal issues. Each participating team has a coach whose research focus the area is in the relevant field of law. He/she assists the team in general
discussions of the problems raised in the case, suggestions regarding available
sources for research, and the methods to reach conclusions.
In the
same way, when the drafted memorials are submitted to the competition
organizers, what follows is that the participants then get a chance to take
part in practicing their oral arguments and receive all-important feedback from
the Coach prior to the opening rounds of the competition. Likewise, when the
competition begins, all the participants have the opportunity to present their
case arguments before at least two panels of Judges comprised of 3 judges
provided by the iPeace.
CONCLUSION
Moot Court
Competitions are
important because they expose the potentials of law students who participate in
them coupled with students getting practical, researching, writing, analysis
and oral advocacy skills in addition to the knowledge and experience gained
through those competitions. All these skills, knowledge and experience is
highly needed by most law students who have a desire of becoming, lawyers,
judges at different levels and render justice to the people in need of it.
By- NSHIMIYIMANA Jean Claude, student of University of Rwanda, School of Law, Year 4 (LLB IV), Law from East Africa.
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