Development Partners in Legal and Judicial Reform Sector

Executive Summary

The Legal and Judicial Reform Strategy is a priority reform program of the fourth mandate of the government. The reform strategy was adopted by the Council of Ministers in 2003 and the development of its action plan took around two years to finalize by the Council of Ministers with full participation from all stakeholders in government agencies, DPs (DPs) and civil society organizations.Presently many of the 97 priority actions in the reform strategy have been actively supported and implemented by DPs and government implementing agencies. However, there is no single, clear information or report on activities supported by the DPs in the legal and judicial reform sector. As a result some support from DPs could be duplicated.

Therefore it is important to grasp the whole picture of who is doing what in this sector to avoid overlapping, to see the gap between the plan and implementation, and to maximize the resources and inputs from DPs. To achieve this CLJR and all members of the TWG-LJR decided to summarize the activities/projects taking place and to collate them in a DP activity report for the sector. The report will provide a single point of information for all stakeholders, in particular DPs, to map out their activities and plan for implementation of the sector reform program.

The report focuses upon only the activities of the DPs supporting the legal and judicial reform sector and does not cover related sector funding information.

Sixteen half hour meetings and interviews were organized with DPs, being AusAID, DANIDA, USAID, EWMI, GTZ ARDP, GTZ PWR, GTZ LMAP, World Bank, CCJAPIII, EU/EC, ILO, France Cooperation, UNICEF, JICA, Labor Arbitration Foundation, and ILO – component indigenous people promotion. Furthermore the report has been reviewed and commented upon by the Project Management Unit of the Council for Legal and Judicial Reform. To validate the report information, the first draft of the report was presented in the meeting of Technical Working Group for Legal and Judicial Reform (TWG-LJR) on the 20^thof February 2009 for reviewing and receiving comments and feedback for the final report (see annex 2 on the presentation slide of the first report). Furthermore, the draft of report was sent to all 20 DPs for final review and comments.

The report focuses upon the information of the projects/programs that DPs (DPs) have supported and implemented in 2008 within the framework of the legal and judicial reform program.

The report will then divide into four main chapters. Firstly, the current progress of DPs activities and other implementing agencies activities in the legal and judicial reform strategy. Secondly, brief information of the structure of coordination mechanism for implementation. Thirdly, the report will examine the gap between planned and actual progress. Lastly, there is a summary and recommendations.

Findings

• The assessment of the DP activities supporting legal and judicial reform is incomplete since the report focused only on the activities of the DPs in the LJR sector. The report should identify more information on the funding of the DPs in the reform. The implications on government implementing agencies from activity implementation and completion should also be assessed in order to ensure the successful implementation of the reform.

• DPs played a very important role in supporting and implementing 70 LJR priority actions from the 97 priority actions in the PAILJRS.

• 12 priority actions have been implemented by RGC agencies without any DP support

• Twenty DPs actively contributed to the legal and judicial sector reform. Six of these (USAID - 20 activities, JICA - 19 activities, France and Ausaid - 18 activities, GTZ - 15 activities, and DANIDA - 14 activities [see table 1 and annex 3 and 4]) are key DPs who have supported many activities in the legal and judicial sector. The DPs have provided both technical and financial support to the legal and judicial reform program.

• 202 activities have been supported by 20 DPs in the legal and judicial sector reform

• Strategic Objective 1 has received much support from DPs with 70 activities supported by 18 DPs

• Fifteen priority actions are yet to be implemented

• There are nineteen implemented projects/programs which require further review

• Sixty-three implementing projects/programs need further support

• Most of the project/programs implemented in the legal and judicial sector are unaligned with the Plan of Action for Implementing Legal and Judicial Reform Strategy adopted by the Council of Ministers in 2005. Most activities have been implemented according to separate institutional frameworks. Recently the number of aligned projects has increased.

• Many key DPs, for example, JICA, USAID, AusAID through CCJAPIII, DANIDA, and UNDP have started to align their programs with the PAILJRS of the government.

• More than 300 million US dollars has been provided to support the sector reform

Major Challenges

• Effective coordination and cooperation

• Ownership

• Capable human resources

• Concrete Project/Program TORs

• Systematic review and evaluation

• Alignment of the program with government reform program

• Effective monitoring and reporting

Recommendations

• An effective mechanism should be systematically used and strengthened in order to enhance the coordination and facilitation of the implementation of the legal and judicial sector reform. The TWG-LJR, which has the General Secretariat of the Council for Legal and Judicial Reform as a secretariat, is a good place for both government and DPs to build their relationship in order to assist the legal and judicial reform process. The sub-group mechanism of the TWG-LJR allows for concerns on specific issues to be raised for discussion and clarification and this needs to be utilized.

• The culture of information sharing be promoted and mechanisms strengthened in order to improve the facilitation and coordination of the implementation of the legal and judicial reform sector. This should include strengthening the capacity of RGC agencies to monitor and report on activities and policy implementation.

• Increased human resource capacity development for government officers to increase RGC ownership of reform activities. Human resource deficiency is a key challenge of the reform program. Both government and DPs should work together to develop more capable human resources. DPs need to play a constructive role in addressing this problem rather than only criticizing the government for its human resource capacity constraints.

• Program alignment with government legal and judicial reform program should be more increased and strengthened. This will avoid duplication of activities in the reform as well as ensure that activities are directly supporting the policy of the government. This alignment is something both government and DPs agreed upon in the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness and the Accra Agenda for Action.

• The Council for the Legal and Judicial Reform should consider the systematic review, monitoring and evaluation of the PAILJRto ensure the process of implementation of the reform is contributing to attaining the common goal of establishing a stable and credible legal and judicial sector. This will also identify incidents of conflict, full implementation failure or blockages in the reform, from both RGC and DPs, so they may be dealt with to ensure mutual accountability for past actions so that lessons for the future may be learnt.

• Short, Measurable, Accuracy, Realistic, and Timetable (SMART)principle for developing the priority actions of the legal and judicial reform should be applied in order to make all action plans clearer in scope and to ensure clear indicators are developed so that implementing agencies and DPs can better manage for results. The systematic implementation of the IMS of the legal and judicial reform program should be undertaken and active cooperation from sector implementing agencies should be improved. A systematic assessment of DP support, including funding, in the Legal and Judicial Reform should be conducted.

• More support from DPs which aligns with the government reform program (PAILJRS) is needed to achieve the common goal of the Legal and Judicial Reform
  

Full Report is her!