An assessment of the availability and use of legal information in primary courts in Tanzania: a case study of Bukoba District, Kagera Region

This study which was conducted in Bukoba district, in Kagera region aimed at assessing the availability and use of legal information in primary courts in Tanzania. The study had five specific objectives, which were to assess availability of legal information in primary courts, to investigate legal information needs of legal decision makers in primary courts, to assess legal information use, to assess legal decision makers’ information seeking behaviours, and to investigate challenges encountered by legal decision makers in seeking legal information. The research used questionnaire, census, observation, and interview methods in data collection. Quantitative data obtained from the study were analyzed by using SPSS version 16.0 by computing frequencies and percentages. Excel 2007 was used to formulate charts in this study. The research findings indicated that generally, there was shortage of legal information in all primary courts although specifically, there was an inadequacy of different types of legal information like law reports, constitutions, by-laws, acts, criminal and civil procedure codes, and penal codes, which were mostly used in the court level. Legal decision makers used legal information and consulted colleagues, personal legal notes, and other legal staff to seek and refer case proceedings. Some of the challenges legal decision makers faced when seeking legal information included inadequacy legal information, absence of law libraries, use of foreign languages, lack of ICT tools, limitation of time, and low income. The present study recommends that primary court stakeholders need to be well informed about availability and use of legal information in order to develop sustainability in legal decision making in primary courts.