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1. Mission Statement
The BLA - LEC is dedicated to providing the legal community and allied professionals with the most up to date and relevant information and techniques which are critical to the development of a professional competitive edge necessary for the realization of equality of opportunity.
These goals will be achieved through high quality continuing legal education programmes.
2. Objectives
The objectives of the BLA - LEC are:
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to build the capacity of lawyers and expose black lawyers to areas of law from which they were previously excluded
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to provide continuing legal education and services to the black community at large
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to increase the number of black lawyers
3. Activities and programmes
3.1 Continuing Legal Education
This progamme is aimed at primarily building capacity and enhancing the skills of lawyers and making the law accessible to all black and or histortically disadvantaged legal practitioners in South Africa. Workshops and seminars in various aspects of the law are conducted for members of the legal profession and stakeholders.
Courses Offered
1. Corporate Law
2. Corporate Tax;
3. Energy and Petroleum Law;
4. Mining Law, Insolvency Law;
5. Pension Law;
6, Sports Law;
7. Entertainment Law;
8. Public Private Partnership Law; and
9. Environmental Law.
10. Mergers and Acquisitions;
11. Polution Law.
Previously Seminars were held on:
1. Banking Law
2. Competition Law
3. Intellectual Property Law
4. A conference on Energy and Petroleum Law
The Legal Education Centre has also recently offered extremely popular courses on Mergers and Acquisitions, Commercial Law.
3.2. Trial Advocacy
The BLA - LEC introduced trial advocacy in South Africa in 1986. The training is designed to improve the advocacy skills and trial techniques of lawyers.
There is a basic three (3) day course and an advanced course that is conducted over six (6) days.
The programme also offers training for instructors to enable to deliver high quality training to participants of the trial advocacy programme.
3.3. Constitutional Litigation
The BLA - LEC in collaboration with the Foundation for Human Rights has developed a training manual for constitutional litigation. Focus of the training is on the Bill of Rights and thus fundamental rights litigation. The manual is a guide to alert users to important issues involved in identifying and constructing a constiututional case.
3.4. Commercial Law Project
The Commercial Law Project has been conducted since 2004. It is a joint venture between the International Senior Lawyers Project base US, the BLA - LEC, the Senior Lawyers Division of the American Bar Association and the Johannesburg law firm Brink Cohen Le Roux. Attorneys conducted it over a period of 13 (thirteen) weeks in Commercial Law Practice with classes presented in the evenings from Mondays to Thursdays (17:30 - 20:30).
The course covers the following topics:
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Drafting of Contracts;
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Specific contracts such as Financial Agreements and Structures; Shareholder’s Agreements; and Agency;
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Distributor, Licensing and Franchise Agreements;
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Specific transactions such as Joint Ventures, IPOs and Stock Exchange Listing;
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Mergers and Acquisitions;
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Project Finance and Public Private Partnerships;
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Dispute Resolution.
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Distributor, Licensing and Franchise Agreements;
The course is conducted by South African instructors that are in their practices and also American and British retired attorneys who give their time and expertise to impart their knowledge and experiences. The course has been run in Johannesburg , Durban and Cape Town. In future other metropolitans may be considered. However in 2007 the course will be run in Johannesburg and Cape Town.
3.5. Refugee and Immigration Law
The BLA - LEC has developed a resource manual on refugee law and practice in South Africa.The legal profession in South Africa has a long history of commitment to social justice. There are many obstacles and challenges facing refugees and asylum seekers in South Africa from accessing their rights.
3.6. Other programmes
(i) Placement scheme
This programme assisted candidate attorneys and qualified law students in securing placement for articles of clerkship and pupillage.
(ii) Salary subsidy
This programme was used to assist law firms to take candidate attorneys in circumstances where they would otherwise be unable to do so.
(iii) Research and Publications
The focus was on researching and publishing current legal issues to facilitate debate within the legal community.
However, the three abovementioned programmes have since been suspended pending funding to implement them accordingly.
4. Funding
The main funder of the BLA-LEC is the Attorneys Fidelity Fund under the auspices of the Law Society of South Africa.
Other funding comes from the abovementioned sponsors for the programmes implemented by the BLA – LEC.
The BLA - LEC continues to enjoy remarkable support from local and international practitioners who have given generously of their time and expertise in the interests of empowering South African law practitioners. We most certainly hope to expand and be able to avail these programmes to our neighbouring countries and the rest of Africa in future. In that case we will source funding and capacity from various partners and or stakeholders that may be identified, going forward.
5. Governance
The Governance of the BLA-LEC comprises of the following:
Gender Empowerment Level
• female staff members: 100%
• female executive directors/senior management: 100%
• females on board of directors: 27%
Board of Trustees
Judge T.H. Madala
Judge J.B. Moloto
Judge J.N.M. Poswa
Professor S. Gutto
Ms N. Mlonzi
Ms D. Mokgatle
Ms M.B. Molemela
Mr Ferguson II (USA)
Mr K. Frazier (USA)
Mr N.A. Matlala
Physical address
33 Hoofd Street
Forum VII, Braampark
Braamfontein, 2017
REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA
Postal address
P.O. Box 5217
Johannesburg
2000
REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA
Telephone: (+27 11) 403 0802
Fax: (+27 11) 403 0814
Website: www.bla.org.za
Email address: info@bla.org.za |
