Reforms to the law of lawyers

by time news

It’s no secret to anyone, the large number of people who have been inclined to study Law, not only because of the prestige generated by being recognized as a lawyer, but also because of their knowledge of the law, the handling of political science or by personal situations that lead them to study legal sciences as a first or second option of knowledge.

It’s no secret to anyone, the large number of people who have been inclined to study Law, not only because of the prestige generated by being recognized as a lawyer, but also because of their knowledge of the law, the handling of political science or by personal situations that lead them to study legal sciences as a first or second option of knowledge.

In previous years it was an honor to have doctors and lawyers in families considered traditional careers in which parents felt proud that their children chose these careers to continue their university studies and were evaluated as the first careers to study.

Thus we see that young people who leave high school opt for Law, as professionals who opt for a second profession and who show interest in the career of the official and private Law faculties of our country to study the career, which today has around of 28, 230 lawyers with suitability according to the figures of the portal of the Judicial Branch, issued by the Supreme Court of Justice until the year 2022.

I make this preamble because it is necessary to talk about comprehensive reforms to Law 9 of 1984 and that there is currently a bill presented by the National Bar Association in the National Assembly, which makes a broad debate necessary and timely not only for the importance of the legal issue, but because of the relevance of the relevant considerations that must be introduced in the aforementioned law, because the problem is not the quantity of lawyers, but rather the quality of lawyers that we are training in official and private universities.

The problem is qualitative and not quantitative, it is imperative to improve the quality of Law teaching and this is achieved through the academy and with the participation of Universities, effective national and international accreditations.

With a single glance at the statistics of recent years of new qualifications, evidence of an increase in the number of graduates from official and private universities, but how do we reinforce this quality learning in the legal training of lawyers? With a bar exam, we have to analyze the answer and establish the roadmaps to follow to improve the quality of legal training and adequate education training for present and future generations.

A new legal professional or one who has been practicing for years, must be in constant learning, in continuous and updated training to provide a quality legal service in all branches of law, a situation that, in the aforementioned reforms, is presented as a problem that is generated by the number of new generations of lawyers and not with those trained in previous years and the authorities in office.

With years of experience as a Law professor and as a former magistrate of the Court of Honor, I believe that it is very necessary and timely to talk about reforms to the Law of the Legal Profession and support the project promoted by the president of the National Bar Association, Dr. Juan Carlos Araoz. However, we see with concern how the National Assembly approves the project in the first debate without a broad consultation of lawyers, academics, professors, students and legal professionals of the Judicial Branch and the Public Ministry, who in some way will be regulated by the provision legal in question.

We say this, after participating in the month of April in the blue room and other very small meetings where the deputies were recommended to create a subcommittee to discuss the preliminary draft and make greater contributions on issues such as, for example, the exception of continuous training for magistrates and judges when they are the first to set the example of lifelong learning and who will be in charge of the examination and continuous training.

Aspects as important as the placement of a bar exam for new lawyers, which is not a restrictive for the suitability of new lawyers, training in the Superior Institute of the judiciary or the Bar Association without this becoming a way of generating income to the detriment of some lawyers who probably cannot bear these costs permanently, are some of the issues that should be widely discussed among lawyers and future lawyers, but above all in the academy to improve and I strongly insist on legal training of lawyers trained and in training in specialization degrees, master’s degrees and doctorates

And above all, the improvement of the educational quality of the training of lawyers, which despite being an issue of quality and academic accreditation should be weighed in public and private universities where titles cannot be issued, without true knowledge of the laws, doing honor to the phrase that it is not ethical to be a lawyer without knowledge of law, which is one of the arguments made by the promoters of the project.

Faced with the issues outlined, it is necessary to consider a broad discussion of the reforms and I call on the National Bar Association, the National Association of Jurists of Panama, the Higher Institute of the Judiciary, the Universities, the Judicial Branch, the students and Law professors to analyze the issues of the reforms such as the illegal exercise of the profession, the sanctions of the Court of Honor, compulsory tuition, lack of professional ethics and exemplary sanctions for offenders, improving the way of advertising, continuing education accessible and a true academic quality in the teaching of law with adequate methodology at the forefront and cutting-edge technology, renewing a profession that, far from disappearing, must remain current with the best quality standards to provide an efficient and effective legal service that the market of today requires as a lawyer of the 21st century.

Dean of the IPU Faculty of Law and Political Science

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