Justice Associate

Contract

This is a National Consultant contract. More about National Consultant contracts.

Background

BACKGROUND

The new Country Programme Document (CPD)2021-2025 is the guiding document for UNDP programming in Eswatini for this program cycle. The CPD is informed by the United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework (UNSDCF), 2021-2025. The UNSDF is based on the evidence collated in the comprehensive Common Country Assessment (CCA) which provides the necessary evidence for guiding the UN support to sustain progress on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It is also aligned to the National Development Plan (2019/20-2021/22) and the Strategic Road Map (2019-2022) of the country.

These national documents prioritize sustainable economic growth and inclusive governance to ensure that economic opportunities reach those furthest behind. Under the Governance and Human rights Pillar, the UNSDCF output provides that by 2025, oversight bodies and government institutions at national and regional level (Tinkhundla) operate in an independent, participatory and accountable manner, ensuring equal access to justice and services with a systematic, participatory implementation and reporting mechanisms for its human rights obligations and SDGs with a focus on leaving no one behind.

The Country office’s (CO) governance program focuses on strengthening public institutions oversight function and supporting effort of the Government of Eswatini to deliver efficient quality services to its citizens. The focus is to improve access to justice, increase citizens voices and participation in public accountability and promotion of transparency. The program also focuses on strengthening knowledge-based research for informed evidence-based advocacy. It also supports the implementation of National Development Strategy and policies especially those aimed at decentralisation of services to citizens and support national and local authority elections.

UNDP in partnership with the Ministry of Justice & Constitutional Affairs seeks to address a number of priorities as articulated in the national documents and the CPD. These activities include legal reform activities, supporting the country to adhere to its reporting obligations, digitalizing the justice systems and improving access to justice especially the most marginalized.

Through the efforts of the Ministry of Justice, the Government of Eswatini recently adopted a legal aid policy which seeks to facilitate access to for those most left behind. The policy provides for the qualifying citizens to access legal advice and assistance, as well as legal services from legal professionals’ pro bono. Further, to enhance the access to justice initiatives, the Ministry will also designate certain areas as information centres for all legal elated queries and these will be known as justice hubs. The Justice hubs seek to bring legal information and services closer to the people. The objective is to have a resource person that can facilitate information sharing sessions, provide legal information on different legal and human rights issues and also serve as a for the community link to other services and entities that can offer redress to the issues presented. The hubs will be used as information portals for entry point for key government entities that offer services to the people and for NGOs that work on the different areas of human rights and governance.

To effectively roll out the justice hubs and the legal aid program the Ministry seeks to engage people who will support the effective delivery of some of these activities especially for the people in remote Eswatini.

Legal services remain largely unfordable and inaccessible for many Emaswati and the Human Rights baseline survey highlighted the serious knowledge gaps on human rights and access to justice. The cost of legal representation, as well as the centrality of legal service providers remains some of the key impediments to accessing justice in Eswatini. The Ministry through various projects is working to address these gaps and challenges.

As a measure to mitigate the gaps and enhance efficiency, UNDP in support to the Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs is recruiting 2 justice associates to support the efforts and interventions aimed at improving access to justice and promoting legal information and human rights in Eswatini.

Duties and Responsibilities

The Justice Associates will work at community level in the piloting projects for the justice hubs and legal aid clinics. The overall objective is to have legal aid services and justice hubs in the 4 regions of Eswatini. The functions of the associates will entail supporting the establishment and setting up of the offices and justice hubs, including the furnishing and appropriate branding of such offices. It will also include providing legal advice, information and assistance to communities; collection and consolidation of data and regarding the legal aid needs of people in that community. This information will assist UNDP, the Ministry of Justice and identified partners to better understand the nature of cases for planning purposes. The justice associates will also support the Ministry, as well as identified partners in the execution of different functions relevant to the governance and human rights agenda.

The key results of the justice associates will have a direct impact and contribution to the success of the programme of the governance programme portfolio, in particular the project on strengthening institutional capacities for rule of law, transparency and access to justice. Many a time, citizens, especially the indigent, are not able to access services due to lack of information, advice and direction on how to go about addressing injustices that befall them. The justice associates thorough justice hubs/legal aid centers will primarily deal with access to information hence contributing to the bigger target of access to justice. Under the overall guidance of the Deputy Resident Representative, Programme, the direct supervision of the Governance Team Leader and in collaboration with the Governance team, the associates will be responsible for collection of data, analysis, and production of reports where needed and are expected to deliver on the following tasks.

• Facilitate the establishment and operationalization of Justice Hubs in the regions.
• Facilitate the setting up of legal aid spaces at community level.
• Support the development of key messages and communication tools for advocacy and awareness raising initiatives.
• Conducting legal advice sessions with community members as needed and provide references for entities that can provide further assistance.
• Develop tools for the effective management of data in the legal aid service centres
• Collect desegregated data of legal issues arising from such sessions as well as the profiles of legal aid seekers at community level and compile periodic reports for the use of the Ministry and Partners.
• Serve as a linkage to community people for government entities working on justice and basic services and NGOs working on human rights and good governance.
• Attend to any other duties aimed at ensuring access to justice for the vulnerable.

Competencies

• Excellent written communication skills in English, including editing.
• Excellent time management and ability to produce outputs as per agreed deadlines.
• Ability to work seamlessly in a multi-cultural environment.
• Ability to launch UNDP projects according to UNDP’s rules and regulations

Required Skills and Experience

Education Work Experience:

• Minimum of Diploma in Law qualification
• Experience working on public interest and human rights will be an added advantage.
• Demonstrated knowledge of the legal system of Eswatini including the traditional legal system.
• Proven experience in moot court proceedings, the legal system of Eswatini including the traditional legal system.