Background

Access to justice is one of the key principles, which determines legal and democratic level of development of the state. The Kyrgyz Republic has laid foundations of creating such kind of access to justice for the vulnerable groups of the citizens. Nevertheless, to ensure the full implementation of constitutional rights must take further steps. A baseline study conducted in two oblasts of the country demonstrated some of the most significant limitations in practical access to justice.

The study revealed that women, children and youth, and persons with disabilities face specific obstacles to enjoy their rights. Many suffer discrimination, violence and economic dependence. More than half the women in the areas of study do not have paid work and employment opportunities for young women is unlikely.

A large percentage of women do not have a resident registration that makes it difficult for them and their children to access to basic social services. More than one out of 20 respondents, married women do not have a marriage certificate; it is another obstacle to realization of an important set of rights attached to the institution of marriage.

Children and young people also faced serious problems in access to justice, such as lack of experience and education, economic dependence, lack of necessary documents. Many young people do not have birth certificates as a result they cannot get ID cards and other documents, and therefore cannot access to formal and informal justice sector in view of that people with disabilities are the most vulnerable ones.

Lack of physical possibility to access the judicial and educational institutions, limited access to public information sufficiently constitute serious obstacles. Dependence on state financial aid creates an unstable situation for many PwDs.

Common challenges on the way of access to justice is a low level of legal literacy of the citizens, low awareness of staff members of formal and informal institutions of justice on the rights and guarantees of vulnerable groups, limited access to free legal aid, as well as gaps in the current legislation and the lack of conformity of norms of international law.

The project “Widening access to justice for legal empowerment in KR” is aimed at legal empowerment of the most vulnerable groups of the population (PwDs, women, children and youth at risk) by:

• Alignment of the Kyrgyz Republic’s legislation on the rights and guarantees of the target groups with international norms and standards;
• Supporting formal and informal justice institutions in provision of affordable, effective and quality services to solve the problems of the target groups in the justice system;
• Increasing legal knowledge of the target groups and contributing to recovery of violated rights;
• In order to achieve the stated objectives, the project intends to hire Regional Specialist for Osh region, who has appropriate qualifications and experience.

Under the guidance and supervision of the Project Coordinator/DGP Chief Dimension/Osh ABD Manager, the Regional Specialist will support implementation of the project activities in the Osh province and promote a client-oriented approach of UNDP.

Duties and Responsibilities

Provide regular consultative and advisory support to beneficiaries:

• Support mapping of legal aid providers process in Osh province for use by project target groups and the general public;
• Assist municipal bodies and local self-governance institutions in providing legal advice and services for vulnerable groups in Osh province, especially in remote areas, by providing relevant training and support for innovative approaches;
• Support local self-governance institutions and CSOs in developing mechanisms for increasing accessibility to free legal aid for the project target groups (i.e., implementation of the State Guaranteed Legal Aid law at the local level);
• Support CSOs and lawyers/paralegals in provision of primary (first level) legal aid and in promoting the informational campaign on the constitutional rights of citizens, including the right to receive free legal aid.

Ensure regular needs assessment and conduct relevant training and consultations for target beneficiaries:

• Support delivery of training programmes to formal and informal justice system actors at the local level (including law enforcement, members of the judiciary, lawyers, local representatives of ministries, local self- governance bodies, CSOs, women’s councils, Aksakal courts, members of youth movements) on the rights of vulnerable groups;
• Support establishment and operationalization of MoJ-run free legal aid regional branches;
• Build capacity of local court administrations in disseminating information on access to free legal aid and for improved community outreach;
• Organize trainings-of-trainers on legal empowerment and access to justice issues for CSOs, representatives of target groups, community leaders, local council deputies, staff of local self- governance institutions, and schoolteachers in Osh province.

Disseminate relevant information among potential audience:

• Support media campaigns through central and regional television, radios, and newspapers;
• Support Ministry of Justice in promotion of its newly created free database of legal acts for wider and more accessible use among public, especially at grassroots levels, and also via mobile application;
• Support Ministry of Social Development in design and delivery of promotional events devoted to legal empowerment and access to justice for PwDs, rural women, and children.

Provide input on the development/revision of manuals and guidelines within the programme:

• Facilitate coordination of programme activities with all relevant institutions/partner organizations and projects at local level;
• Arrange physical access to selected justice institutions for PwDs in Osh province;
• Support mobile visits of State Registration Service in cooperation with relevant state bodies and CSOs to remote rural areas for service delivery;
• Support piloting of the newly adopted State Registration Service procedures/mechanisms in cooperation with local self-governance bodies and through information and communications technologies, including mobile applications;
• Establish coordination networks on free legal aid and access to justice with relevant partners and stakeholders at the regional level;
• Ensure timely submission of all periodic reporting and requested information, feedback or comments to A2J Project Coordinator;
• Regularly conduct monitoring of processes developments at grassroots level. Undertake field visits when needed;
• By request of the Project Coordinator, perform other tasks, aimed at achieving the goals and objectives of the project.

Competencies

Core Competencies:

• Promoting ethics and integrity, creating organizational precedents;
• Ability to work in a multicultural and multinational team;
• Creating an environment of creativity and innovation;
• Building and promoting effective teams;
• Creating and promoting enabling environment for open communication;
• Creating an emotionally intelligent organization;
• Sharing knowledge across the organization and building a culture of knowledge sharing and learning;
• Promoting learning and knowledge management/sharing is the responsibility of each staff member;
• Fair and transparent decision making; calculated risk-taking.

Functional Competencies:  

Building Strategic Partnerships:

• Analyzes general information and selects materials in support of partnership building initiatives.

Promoting Organizational Learning and Knowledge Sharing:

• Researches best practices and poses new, more effective ways of doing things;
• Documents innovative strategies and new approaches.

Job Knowledge/Technical Expertise:

• Understands the main processes and methods of work regarding to the position;
• Possesses basic knowledge of organizational policies and procedures relating to the position and applies them consistently in work tasks;
• Strives to keep job knowledge up-to-date through self-directed study and other means of learning;
• Demonstrates good knowledge of information technology and applies it in work assignments.

Promoting Organizational Change and Development:

• Documents ‘best practices’ in organizational change and development within and outside the UN system;
• Demonstrates ability to identify problems and proposes solutions.

Design and Implementation of Management Systems:

• Uses information/databases/other management systems;
• Provides inputs to the development of simple system components.

Client Orientation:

• Reports to internal and external clients in a timely and appropriate fashion;
• Organizes and prioritizes work schedule to meet client needs and deadlines;
• Establishes, builds and sustains effective relationships within the work unit and with internal and external clients;
• Responds to client needs promptly.

Promoting Accountability and Results-Based Management:

• Gathers and disseminates information on best practice in accountability and results-based management systems;
• Prepares timely inputs to reports;
• Maintains databases.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Bachelor degree or equivalent in law, public administration, management and/or social or political sciences.

Experience:

• 3 years of relevant work experience in the in the area of law and/or jurisprudence;
• 5 years of experience working with international organizations, high-level government officials representing central governmental bodies and local administrations;
• Experience in preparing and holding trainings; drawing up analytical documents;
• Experience in the usage of computers and office software packages (MS Word, Excel, etc.).

Language:

• Fluency in Kyrgyz and Russian.

Application

Applications without the UNDP Personal history form (P.11) will not be considered. Please download P.11 form from http://www.kg.undp.org/content/kyrgyzstan/ru/home/operations/jobs/.

Please upload P.11 form instead of CV;

Please combine all your documents into one (1) single PDF document as the system only allows to upload maximum one document.