(2018) 2 African Human Rights Yearbook 129 also explain EU law’s unduly prominent presence in Ugandan judicial decisions, relative to AU law. Thirdly, EAC law appears to enjoy a potentially significant advantage over AU law in terms of the scope for a more reflexive interaction between that system and the domestic order. Under the EAC Treaty, domestic courts are entitled to refer matters relating to EAC law to the EACJ, which allows domestic courts to engage, in the judicial function, with their counterparts at the EAC level.257 This interaction might then form a natural basis for greater attention to, and respect for, EACJ jurisprudence relative to the more apparently extrinsic jurisprudence of the AU. However, todate this right does not seem to have been invoked by any of the domestic courts in the East African Community, and there is no record of the EACJ having delivered any such preliminary rulings in the context of domestic litigation. Relatedly, service on the EACJ by Judges concurrently engaged by the Ugandan judiciary also seems to have created a window for enhanced familiarity with, and receptiveness to, EAC law. The EACfriendly decision in the 2013 High Court case of Nalima258 might, for instance, in part be explained by this factor. By contrast, Ugandan jurists who have served on the African Commission have typically not been serving Judges in the Ugandan judiciary, potentially negatively affecting the permeation of that law into the domestic system.259 The above factors might explain – to different extents – the relatively weak imprint of AU law as a feature of the jurisprudence of Ugandan courts. However, on their own, they cannot fully explain the trends identified in this article. This is an important enquiry – one which merits more detailed research, one which preferably seeks the views of serving and retired Ugandan Judges. Ultimately, only they are 256 257 258 259 years with support from JLOS and EU under the Commercial Justice Reform Programme’). See also, Uganda Judiciary ‘Denmark supports access to justice in Uganda’ 28 May 2014 http://judiciary.go.ug/data/news/99/6850/Denmark %20Supports%20Access%20to%20Justice%20in%20Uganda..html (accessed 15 January 2019). The report recounts that Denmark, through its international development arm – the Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA) has supported Uganda’s judiciary, including through, ‘providing technical expertise’ at least since 1989. It further notes that Denmark has ‘constructed most of the Ugandan courts’ and has trained more than 200 judicial officers, including Judges. These have received training in such areas as ‘human rights, commercial transaction, management of courts, commercial law, European law and administration of Justice in Nordic countries’ and that this training has been ‘with a view of comparing and replicating it in Uganda’. Art 34 of the Treaty for the Establishment of the East African Community appears to straddle the line between requiring such a reference and making it subject to the discretion of national courts. In the end, the language used points towards both obligation and discretion, with the latter being narrowly favoured. According to that provision: ‘Where a question is raised before any court or tribunal of a Partner State concerning the interpretation or application of the provisions of this Treaty or the validity of the regulations, directives, decisions or actions of the Community, that court or tribunal shall, if it considers that a ruling on the question is necessary to enable it to give judgment, request the Court to give a preliminary ruling on the question’. n 203. For instance, the current Ugandan member of the Commission, Hon. Meddie Kaggwa, is Chair of the Uganda Human Rights Commission.