Constitutional Court in Children’s Institute v Presiding Officer, Children’s Court, Krugersdorp, and Others [2013] 2 SA 620 (cc) that role is to promote and protect the public interest in two key ways, First, “by ensuring that courts consider a wide range of options and are well informed”; an Second, “by creating space for interested non-parties to provide input on important public interest matters, particularly those relating to constitutional issues.
At its core, the role of the amicus is to help courts to promote and protect constitutional rights. The mechanism by which this is done is to provide an opportunity for any party interested in a constitutional issue raised in existing proceedings to be admitted as amicus to make factual and/or legal submissions that put the court in a better position to adjudicate on these issues than would be the case were the admission denied.

UGANDA

Although there are no formal rules governing the role of amicus curiae in Uganda, the issue has been the subject of legal scholarship. M. Ssekaana and S. Ssekaana in their book, Civil Procedure and Practice in Uganda (2010) (at page 50) have considered the role of amicus curiae as follows:

“In its ordinary use the term implies a friendly intervention of counsel to remind the court of some matter of law which has escaped its notice in regard of which it is in danger of going wrong. It seems that such a person is not a party to an action but one who calls the attention of the court to some decision or point of law which appears to have been overlooked… Where the intervention would only serve to widen the case between the parties or introduce a new cause of action, the intervention should not be allowed. Amicus curiae is not a party to an action has no control over it and generally should not be allowed costs. The right of amicus curiae to address the court is purely discretionary and is not dependent upon the consent of the parties to