DOHA: There are more judges in Qatar than lawyers.
Official statistics reflect that there were 202 judges here last year as opposed to only 177 legal practitioners.
In fact, the number of judges almost doubled last year from a mere 105 in 2010 due, possibly, to an ever-increasing number of court cases.
Qatari courts heard more than 38,000 cases last year, up from 22,709 in 2010, with the yearly jump in the number being over 15,000.
Figures released by the national office of statistics, Qatar Statistics Authority (QSA), suggest that court cases totalled barely 11,729 in the year 2009.
In other words, the cases have more than trebled over a span of just three years — from 2009 until last year. A vast majority of the cases in 2011 pertained to bad cheques (cheques that were issued without sufficient balance in bank accounts). The problem of bad cheques seemed to have peaked last year as a worrisomely large number of cases (23,422) were filed — as against only 11,578 such disputes having gone to court in 2010.
It is interesting to note that in 2009 not a single bad cheque complaint was taken to court, QSA statistics reflect.
Traffic violations accounted for the third largest number of court cases last year, but their number was only 3,096 as opposed to more than 5,400 cases registered in 2010.
Crimes to do with breach of residency and immigration laws accounted for the second highest number of cases after bad cheque litigations, totaling 7,514.
As regards lawyers, they totalled 167 in 2010, 16 of them women, whereas only two of the 202 judges were females in 2011.
Out of 177 lawyers, 117 were Qatari in 2011, four from other GCC states, 43 Arab and 13 from non-Arab countries. There were an additional eight trainee counsels—two of them women.
Contacted for comment, lawyer Mohsin Thiyab Al Suwaidi told this newspaper that not many law graduates preferred to take up legal practice since it called for high competence.
Most law graduates preferred employment, he said. Al Suwaidi insisted that the fact that there were more judges in the country than lawyers showed that Qatar had a very efficient judiciary.
According to another lawyer who didn’t want to be named, only 20 percent of fellow Qatari professionals (lawyers) attend court and many of them do not even depute any representative to pursue a case.
As for judges, the maximum number was in the courts of First Instance (66), followed by presidents (heads of three-judge panels) of these courts (45). The Courts of Appeal had 42 judges in 2011.
The Peninsula
