Analysis of prospects and bottlenecks to establish a Specialised Environmental Court or Tribunal in Zambia

Abstract

The study used a desktop-based technique and analysed the ECTs’ model solutions in jurisdictions such as Kenya, India and Australia, that have successfully established these judicial institutions as alternative to regular courts in adjudicating environmental cases. The study revealed that ECTs are public institutions or officials in the government’s judicial or executive arm with authority to specialise in adjudicating environmental, natural resource development, land-use development, climate change and interrelated cases. The study found that whereas Zambia is increasingly experiencing its own share of numerous environmental teething problems, it has no specialised ECT. The subsisting system of adjudicating environmental disputes seem incoherent, fragmented, and inefficient. One of the study’s major findings is that enforcement of environmental claims through the regular courts is seriously hampered by the absence of a provision for “a right to a clean, safe and healthy environment” in the Constitution of Zambia. Additionally, regular courts have not filled the void by creatively construing constitutional guarantee, such as by reading the right to life as affording each person the right to a healthy, pollution-free environment and to give effective remedies that are enforceable in court. However, the study concluded that it should not be difficult for Zambia to establish an environmental court or tribunal because under the Constitution of Zambia, the Chief Justice may establish specialist courts to hear specified cases, such as environmental cases. Therefore, the study advocates the creation of an environmental court or tribunal to ensure prompt administration of environmental justice in Zambia.