Mohloai Mpesi
The Lesotho Law Reforms Commission (LLRC) has compiled a comprehensive database of the country’s laws, spanning from the precolonial era to the present day.
This extensive project, which began in 2016, has catalogued approximately 16,000 laws in preparation for the publication of a second catalogue indexing all the country’s laws.
The initial edition, published in 2020, covered laws from 1800 to 2018.
This milestone was highlighted during a validation workshop held at Victory Hall on Tuesday.
Established by the Lesotho Law Reform Commission Act No. 5 of 1993, the LLRC is tasked with reviewing and systematically developing Lesotho’s legal framework. Its goals include eliminating defects in statutes, simplifying laws, and adopting more effective methods for law administration. Additionally, the LLRC is responsible for reconsolidating laws and repealing outdated or obsolete legislation.
The commission received financial support from the European Union late last year to facilitate the external editing and peer review of the second edition to ensure it meets the required standards upon publication in September this year.
In his address, the Minister of Justice and Law, Richard Ramoeletsi, emphasized the importance of the index, which he said would serve as a valuable resource for professionals, students, and researchers studying Lesotho’s legal history.
“The Lesotho Law Reforms Commission published the first edition of the index of Lesotho Laws from 1800 to 2018 in 2020. At that time, the inventory of Lesotho’s laws was chaotic with no comprehensive database, making it difficult to trace the historical development of each piece of legislation. This index provides our citizens, students, professionals, and lawmakers with a reliable historical narrative of the laws governing Lesotho,” Mr Ramoeletsi said.
The index is divided into four parts: an Alphabetic index, a Chronological index, a Subject index, and a Historical index. The Historical index is the most comprehensive, detailing how each statute has been affected by subsequent enactments.
Mr Ramoeletsi highlighted that the collection of laws was aimed at creating an informed nation, promote the rule of law, and support good governance, which the current administration had “prioritized” since taking office in October 2022.
“One of the main goals of the current government is to uphold the rule of law and good governance. The index, which enables easy access to laws, forms part of this commitment. It aims to achieve an informed nation, particularly among marginalized groups, regulate entities, enhance oversight institutions, improve service delivery, stimulate economic growth, and protect investor rights, peace, security, and stability,” he said.
The Speaker of the National Assembly, Tlohang Sekhamane, noted the index would aid the legislature in drafting new laws by providing knowledge of existing legislation to avoid repetition.
In addition, Puleng Rammolai from the Law Reforms Council explained the challenges in gathering all the laws, saying there were instances of improper storage and incomplete inventories.
“When we talk of the index of the laws of Lesotho from 1800 to 2023, we refer to a database or inventory of all the laws from precolonial times to date. This extensive exercise involved working on more than 2000 laws of Lesotho and documenting them according to their subject areas, chronology, and enactment years,” Ms Rammolai said.
She added that the lack of a proper database and storage made the task difficult, and the commission had to work through incomplete inventories to recommend repeals.
Legal expert, Advocate Kabelo Mohau KC, who worked on developing the index, highlighted the challenges posed by outdated laws.
“We found very old laws still in force because they had not been repealed by parliament, as they were inherited from the British. There were also issues of repetition and inconsistencies between headings and contents of legal notices. For example, some subordinate legislation had headings indicating a repeal, but the content was about amendments instead,” Adv Mohau KC explained.
He stressed the importance of careful handling of such legislation to avoid disastrous consequences for litigants.
The second edition of the index is set to rectify these issues and provide a comprehensive and reliable resource for all stakeholders involved in Lesotho’s legal system.
