GCC Habilitating and preparing Arbitrators Programme concluded its fifth and last cycle with the attendance of 90 participants from public and private establishments in the UAE and GCC countries. The programme came as an initiative by the Abu Dhabi Chamber of Commerce and Industry in cooperation with GCC Commercial Arbitration Center and the Institute of Training and Judicial Studies (ITJS) in Abu  Dhabi.

His Excellency Consultant Mohammed Bin Hamad Al Badi, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Justice; HE Dr. Mohammed Mahmoud Al Kamali, Director General of the ITJS; HE Ahmed Al Najim, Secretary General of the GCC Commercial Arbitration Center; and HE consultant Dr. Majdi Ibrahim Qasim, Executive Director of  Abu Dhabi Commercial Conciliation & Arbitration Center (ADCCAC), attended the concluding session of the programme.

The programme included a preparatory stage on “Arbitration Concept and its Legal Nature” which is a mandatory stage for non-Law and Islamic Sharia and Rights students. The five stages of the programme were conducted over six months; the first of which focused on informing of arbitration and conciliation and its legal conditions (formality, objectivity and mechanisms) and the implications of arbitration, its interpretations, its independency from the contract and the conditions of drafting an arbitration.

The second stage of the programme included lectures on the means of preparing an arbitration application form and filling it, the response of the defenders on this application, forming an arbitration committee, opening up first procedural session, preparing the session’s minutes-of-meeting, specifying the arbitration venue and language and the hindrances that might rise such as interruption or absence, and the evidence before the arbitration committee as well as issuing the decision of the arbitration.

The third stage of the programme shed the light on the information and data that should be available when making any decision of an arbitration, meeting the demands of the two disputed sides, exceeding the specialties of the arbitration committee and the incapability of the arbitrator, violating the statute by the arbitrator, and resolving some or all the subjects of the dispute.

The fourth stage of the programme included a session under the title: “Executing or Annulling a Resolution”, whereas the fifth stage concentrated on the (theoretical and practical arbitration practices).

Dr. Majdi Ibrahim Qasim, Executive Director of  ADCCAC, supervised the five stages of the programme as well as the preparatory stage.

His Excellency Mohammed Helal Al Muhairi, Director General of the Abu Dhabi Chamber, said that organizing the programme comes within the framework of the Chamber and the ADCCAC to provide high-level training programmes for participants and enabling them from utilizing the best means in managing and resolving commercial disputes  as well as enhancing the culture of arbitration amongst companies and establishments in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi and to encourage them from benefiting from the services of the ADCCAC.

“The ADCCAC is an initiative by the Abu Dhabi Chamber which aims at prepping all the facilities for its members in a way that contributes to the development and stability of their businesses and at resolving the disputes that arise from commercial relations,” Al Muhairi said, noting that the center employs the most experienced personnel in this regard and it provides its services taking into consideration confidentiality and preservation of companies information and data.

For his part, Dr. Majdi Ibrahim Qasim, Executive Director of  ADCCAC, said that the programme made a huge success in the GCC region, pointing out that the programme succeeded in achieving its targets in habilitating national cadres to resolve commercial disputes in alternative means as well as lessening the financial burdens of traditional judiciary courts and spreading the culture of commercial arbitration in its scientific and practical forms within the Gulf and Arabian societies.

“The programme met its goals in informing of arbitration and its legal nature, and the segregation line between the national resolution and the international one, as well as informing of the role of the traditional judiciary courts in the arbitration structure,” Qasim said, adding that the programme also shed the light on the legal aspects of contracts and their effects on the arbitration structure and the arbitration concepts in international investments and contract disputes in addition to informing about arbitration, arbitration centers and UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules.