The directive, titled Executive Order RNB No. 12 of 2026, was issued on Tuesday, July 7, 2026, to coincide with Saba Saba Day, which commemorates resistance against authoritarianism in East Africa.
The President of the Uganda Law Society, Isaac K. Ssemakadde, has issued an executive order abolishing the use of “colonial-era” court honorifics and rituals of deference by lawyers, declaring that members of the legal profession should no longer bow before judicial officers or address judicial officers as "My Lord," "Your Lordship," "My Lady," or "Your Worship."
The directive, titled Executive Order RNB No. 12 of 2026, was issued on Tuesday, July 7, 2026, to coincide with Saba Saba Day, which commemorates resistance against authoritarianism in East Africa.
In the order, Ssemakadde argued that Uganda's judiciary has been weakened by executive interference, judicial corruption, prolonged delays, selective justice, and what he described as systematic failures to address enforced disappearances, torture and attacks against lawyers.
He also accused the military of undermining judicial independence through illegal arrests, extrajudicial searches, detention of civilians, court invasions, obstruction of lawyers and journalists, and the trial of civilians before military tribunals.
