Law

The very purpose of the WTO trading system is to keep away barriers to international trade in goods and services. The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) is one of the WTO administered multilateral trading instruments, aimed at freeing trade in services by regulating government measures affecting trade in services. The WTO/GATS system provides varieties of obligations/conditions for countries wishing to join the system. Before joining the WTO countries are required to adjust many aspects their trading systems in the way that facilitate free trade in services. Members of the organization have also variety of obligations to be in existence as long as membership is not terminated. Thus, joining the WTO/GATS system has a huge impact on the service sectors of members. Accordingly, this impact is expected to happen on the telecommunications services sector of Ethiopia, on the process to accede the WTO since 2003. The current operation of the Ethiopian telecommunications services sector monopolized by an enterprise, Ethio-Telecom. Despite the law provides a possibility whereby investors (domestic or foreign) can invest on the telecommunications services sector jointly with the government, currently almost all activities in the sector are operated by Ethio-telecom. With these and many other situations in the sector Ethiopia is on the way to accede the WTO. This article is therefore devoted to scrutinize the impact of Ethiopia’s accession to the WTO on its telecommunications services sector.

International law is applicable on the members of international community which are states, international organisations and individuals. The term ‘state’ is a political expression which is a means to rule over certain territory. However the kind of state we visualize today did not exist in the ancient times. Besides, international and political thinkers call the present system of nation-states as Westphalian system. Therefore the researcher feels it worthy to make a historical research to trace the origin of nation-state being a prime subject of the international law and to highlight the myth involved. The paper begins with the Greek city-states which existed before Christ and travels through Roman kingdom, feudal system, the Holy Roman Empire and the Peace of Westphalia. The paper brings to light the Westphailian myth regarding the origin of nation-state and reveals how it originated during the Holy Roman Empire.

The prevailing spirit in doctrine and Sharia of Islam, from the beginning to tolerance, mitigation and disposal Distress and constriction, focused and grounded. Necessity to reductionist, in practice the provisions, variable and universal religion, in accordance with the principles of freedom and liberty, and the necessity of conflict with existing laws, including the reasons underlying the rule Religious permission, the legitimacy of the state of some of the laws, apply. Foundation legitimacy of discharge, the rules «Distress and constriction», and «no- damage» is Located. This study, in the light of legal texts, rules and principles, explain the rule Religious permission, as an important, focuses on Islamic law. In this regard, in addition to explaining the concept, and the status of the above, the expression and show some of it, of transactions, punishments and suspension provisions in the law, and the rules of civil law, criminal law and family law, encourages. The results of this study indicate that, approach the permissions, at present, according to the positions of «Obstruction of religious knowledge», and «Absence of religious texts», etc. necessity in solving «Updated issues» , with a new approach in «Demands of the time», is considered.

The new Trade Practice and Consumer Protection Proclamation of Ethiopia come into effect in Ethiopia in August 2010 i.e. Proclamation No. 685/2010. Therefore, that, after three years of the effective period, Proclamation No. 813/2013 repealed it. The Trade Practice and Consumer Protection Authority is the regulatory body, which also has a judicial mandate, oversees the implementation of the law. The law regulates trade practices by protecting businesses from anti-competitive and unfair trade practices to ensure a competitive business environment. Henceforth, this research analyses the effectiveness of these two proclamations since their ultimate goal is to secure the healthiest trade environment in the territorial hemisphere of Ethiopia. On the other side, since the two laws have their own positive impact on the economy of the country, substantially this research gives due consideration for the empirical effect of these two proclamations extraordinarily in the Eastern Zone of Tigray.

Enforcement of competition and consumer protection regime and ensuring fair competition and consumer interest in a free market economy depends, among others, upon the effectiveness of competition and consumer protection organ, which is responsible for enforcing. Existing studies reveal that establishment of competition and consumer protection authorities are the most effective way to implement competition and consumer protection law. Despite Ethiopia’s effort to legislate three times in a decade and improve the structure of competition and consumer protection authority, still, the competition and consumer protection legal regime have gaps that will negatively affect enforcement of competition and consumer protection law. This article mainly focuses on identifying authorities and institutional designs for consumer protection and competition, which have, in one way or another, the powers on competition and the consumer protection regime under Ethiopian trade competition and consumer protection laws. Moreover, it will assess and evaluate the autonomy and main functions of the existing enforcement organ of competition and consumer protection law based on the pertinent provisions of the current legislation of the country. Finally, the article ends up with a short conclusion and recommendations on the matters discussed under the main body of the article.

Even though Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) allow for the involvement of the private sector in the provision of public infrastructure facilities as a result of budget constraints on the part of the public sector, the private sector is required to raise substantial part, or even the whole of the needed funds to complete PPP projects. Raising such funds could be challenging considering that long-term financial lending by commercial banks in Nigeria is evolving. The option of dedicated infrastructure funds managed by asset management firms is one that Nigeria ought to pursue with seriousness in order to effectively bridge the existing funding gap for infrastructure projects. This paper analyses the need to adopt infrastructure mutual funds as a means to provide funding for various PPP projects in the country. The paper argues that the population of Nigeria is an advantage as it provides a large investing market that can be tapped. The use of infrastructure mutual funds should be encouraged in order to have a greater percentage of the populace participating as against private equity infrastructure funds that target high net worth individuals as such funds usually make the rich get richer. The Paper concludes by recommending the introduction of specialist infrastructure mutual funds by the large asset management firms in the country.

Intellectual property insurance is a contract that covers occurred risks to intellectual entities inducing damage to their owners and users or the third person and compensates those damages. Now, since the subject of this secure coverage is different from other kinds of commercial insurances, it is essential to formulate and analyze elements of intellectual property insurance contract. Now, according to the fact that this is a new kind of insurance policy particularly if it is to cover all risks of intellectual property, it seems that identifying elements of this kind of insurance policy and investigating its certain related problems is of significance importance and interest considering the specific nature of intellectual creations and different concept of risk in the insurable interest. In this paper, these issues have been put under investigation. Key words: risk (sinister), insurable interest, offensive insurance, defensive insurance.

The past half-decade has witnessed exponential use of the social media in Kenya. This has been made possible through enhanced internet connectivity especially through the use of mobile phones. Cybercrime has therefore emerged as a serious threat. Surprisingly, cybercriminals appear undeterred by the prospect of arrest and prosecution as they operate with impunity on the internet posing a risk to the financial health of corporations, privacy of the citizens who use the internet and also posing a threat to the security of the nation. The media has reported numerous occasions when cybercriminals have managed to interfere with the operations of the state. The alleged interference of Russian hackers in the 2016 US presidential election demonstrated how cybercriminals posed a threat to democratic institutions and democratic processes. Similar allegations were made in relation to the2013 and 2017 presidential elections in Kenya. It has also been reported that the terrorist group, ISIS (Islamic State of Syria and Iraq) has unit of hackers known as the Cyber Caliphate whose primary function is to propagate the ISIS agenda online. Most recently, the members of parliament in Kenya called upon the Inspector General of the Police and mobile service providers to launch investigations into cons who are registering numbers in their names and sending obscene images. This paper will examine the laws governing cybercrime in Kenya and make suggestions on law review to deal with the cybercrime menace.

The term enforced disappearance has been derived from the Spanish word “Desaparicion forzada ”which was coined in 1960s to signify a practice of abduction and secret detention used by security forces of Guatemala in furtherance of their counter insurgency measures. The idea of enforced disappearances was later applied by a lot of countries to deny the right of free speech to its citizens. According to the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID) in the period between 1974 and 1995 more than 100 cases of forced disappearances were recorded in countries such as India, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, and Pakistan etc. Enforced Disappearances not only leads to a violation of the basic human rights of the victim but also leads to emotional abuse and economic marginalization of the family members. It also makes women and children vulnerable to sexual abuse and exploitation at the hands of the officials of the state. The Convention For The Protection of All Persons From Enforced Disappearances enjoins the state parties to make a special law on enforced disappearances in order to provide for such an offence in their penal code and also to provide a special mechanism for investigation, prosecution etc. However, a lot of state parties are yet to make a special law on it. The objective of this paper is to offer a critical insight into the developments in the International Plane for curbing this ghastly practice. The paper also conducts an analysis of the Convention and examines the loopholes present therein. In the end it attempts to suggest safeguards to prevent such a practice.

The Sustainable development goals are contained in paragraph 54 of the UN resolution A/RES/70/1 of September 2015. They were achieved through a collaborative process of 194 countries, civil society and other interested parties. They succeed the Millennium Development Goals. The 17 Sustainable Development Goals were formulated following the principles agreed upon under resolution A/RES/66/288 which is also known as The Future We Want. The passing of the Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development was a long process involving deliberations and consultative meetings starting from Rio+20 Conference in 2012. Kenya made a commitment to actualize the 17 SDGs. However, Kenya runs the risk of failing to achieve the 17 sustainable development goals and their 169 targets if the challenges that led to the failure to achieve MDGs are not addressed. The most notable challenge was the failure to anchor the policy goals within the legal framework. This paper examines the legislative and policy gaps in the implementation of SDGs in Kenya. It will also explore the challenges that Kenya is facing in the implementation of Sustainable Development Goals and propose possible solutions to those problems.