The unending trials, the length of the procedures, the difficulty related to the execution of the judicial decisions, the distance of the jurisdictions and the dilatory practices, such are the few challenges which are at the base of the modification of the Civil Procedure Code of Burundi already 18 years old, the object of the plenary session of Friday, April 28, 2023.

Voted unanimously by the MPs present, this bill amending the Civil Procedure Code brings remedies to these failures by:
1. The setting up of the pre-trial judge whose mission will be to watch over the fair course of the procedure, especially the punctuality of the exchange of conclusions and the discovery. Moreover, he will be able to address injunctions to the parties or to their lawyers, to proceed to communications, to exchanges of conclusions. Above all, what makes his strength is that it is up to him to set the rhythm of the instruction, the speed of the instruction in view of the complexity of the case. He will be able to invite the parties to call into question all the interested parties whose presence he deems necessary for the solution of the case. In other words, the pre-trial judge will be able to obtain and practically impose a subjective extension of the proceedings in the interests of good justice.

2. Reduction of procedural delays: the main criticism of burundian justice is the slowness in processing cases. Thus, in order to promote celerity in the processing of cases and to reduce the ever-increasing judicial backlog, this bill introduces shorter time limits before all jurisdictions and in all phases of the proceedings.
3. Authorization of the private sale before the forced sale: this bill allows the debtor pursued by a measure of forced execution to sell himself the seized goods to allocate the price to the payment of the creditors.

4. Clarification of the enforcement procedure: courts regularly pronounce judicial decisions ordering defaulting tenants to leave the property. However, they experience difficulties in enforcing these decisions. Article 438 will clearly define from now on, the procedure applicable for the eviction of defaulting tenants.
5. The establishment of the dissident opinion: in several modern legislations, the law allows judges to publish individual or dissenting opinions when they disagree with the judgment in which they participate. The main advantage of this practice is that it makes it possible to expose the different possible points of view on the same legal problem, which is of great interest not only to jurists but also to litigants and their lawyers.