Issue No.3: Whether the First Instance Division erred in law
when it held that the 1st Respondent had no duty under the EAC
Treaty to supervise the 2nd, 3rd and 5th Respondents to comply
with their obligations under the Charter, the Protocol, and the
Vienna Convention.
76. The Secretary General’s supervisory role is articulated in Article
29(1) of the Treaty. It provides that:“1. Where the Secretary General considers that a Partner State has
failed to fulfil an obligation under this Treaty or has infringed a
provision of this Treaty, the Secretary General shall submit his or
her findings to the Partner State concerned for that Partner State
to submit its observations on the findings;”
In the Katabazi case (supra), it was observed that:“....the above provision requires the Secretary General to
“submit his or her findings to the Partner State concerned and
that [and] ...there is nothing to prohibit the Secretary General
from conducting an investigation on his/her own initiative...”.
77. We do subscribe to the above reasoning that the Secretary General
can act, on his own initiative when there are allegations of violation of
the Treaty, or when he or she considers that a Partner State has
failed to fulfil an obligation under the Treaty. In this case, the
Secretary General indicated that, once he got information of the
Appellant’s complaint, he wrote to all Respondents seeking a
clarification on the matter. Once the Reference was filed, he left the
matter in the Court’s hands. The First Instance Division found
that
in the circumstances of this Reference, the Secretary General could
25