Senior consultant to work as Child Protection Technical Advisor, Kigali Rwanda, 12 months (work from MINIJUST) – For Rwanda Nationals ONLY

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Background: 

The Government of Rwanda is strongly committed to ensuring that all children achieve their full potential in a safe and protective environment including children in conflict with the law. However, the justice system is still solely punitive including for juveniles and women with young children, and that unnecessarily increases the number of children ending up in prison and even leave much more young children unattended as their convicted mothers head to prison.  About 4500 women (www.prisonstudies.org/country/rwanda), 550 juveniles (ILPD, Visit of Nyagatare juvenile prison, March 2024) and 500 under-three infants are in prisons (www.unicef.org/rwanda/media/5391/file/Child%20Protection%20in%20Rwanda.pdf). As women facing justice are generally single mothers with three to four children on average, there are estimated might be tens of thousands of children without parental care as a result. These children are at increased risk of dropping out of school, living on the street, exposure to violence, abuse and exploitation, and many other protection violations.

The government has long recognized the importance of ensuring that children grow up safe and protected within well-supported families. This recognition is reflected in the country’s constitution and in policies such as the Integrated Child Rights Policy, the Justice for Children Policy, the Criminal Justice Policy (CJP), and the Alternative Dispute Resolution Policy (ADRP). On the management of Justice, the government recommended through the Criminal Justice Policy (CJP) and the Alternative Dispute Resolution Policy (ADRP) of 2022, a shift from punitive justice when dealing with children, women and people with a disability, and adopt restorative administration of justice through diversion, probation and mediation.

Both the Government of Rwanda and UNICEF recognize the importance of developing a wider child protection system that addresses all forms of abuse, neglect, exploitation, and violence in Rwanda. The MINIJUST and NCDA have undertaken reproachment to coordinate the integration of children facing justice into the child protection systems including case management system for better protection. In 2024, MINIJUST completed an assessment of the justice sector’s capacity to implement the ADRP and the CJP, with one of the recommendations in the CJP being the development of a diversion programme for child offenders, the strengthening of parole and the introduction of probation services for children in contact with the law.

Purpose of Assignment:

To support this progressive and strategic shift to a restorative justice system for children, UNICEF will second to the Ministry of Justice a senior, well experienced consultant who will play a lead technical and strategic role in coordination with NCDA, for the implementation of friendly justice mechanisms as recommended by the CJP for children, women and persons with disabilities (including probation, diversion and alternative to imprisonment), and inclusion of children facing justice in the child protection case management systems under the aegis of NCDA, to realize their rights to protection as outlined above.

Scope of Work:

The consultant will provide coordination and technical support to MINIJUST and other relevant Government agencies such as the NCDA, to strengthen child justice objectives within the framework of Rwanda’s development priorities and global standards in justice for children as well as Rwanda’s child protection system. Specifically, the consultant will support in developing, consulting, testing and rolling-out a diversion mechanism for children in conflict with the law and ensuring that alternatives to detention are the main judicial response used in cases involving children. The consultant will also clarify the role of Child Protection and Welfare 

Officers (CPWOs) in particular, specifically in the implementation of the restorative justice mechanisms as spelt out in the CJP and ADRP and the recommendations of the Justice sector capacity gap analysis report (2024).

In addition, the consultant will facilitate alignment of institutional mandates to streamline child justice service provision and referral mechanisms in the Justice system. The work will support development and/or strengthening of appropriate coordination, monitoring and reporting mechanisms and tools, to ensure coordination is functioning at all levels and monitoring  mechanisms are ensuring generation and management of disaggregated data on child justice.

He will also provide expert support and guidance to the Ministry of Justice in its coordination role of the Justice Sector for the implementation of restorative justice mechanisms along the whole continuum of services, from investigation to sentencing, focusing on diversion and probation for vulnerable groups and particularly children in. The consultant will also assist the Ministry of Justice in developing a diversion mechanism and program for children in conflict with the law.

Work Assignment Overview

Tasks/Milestone:

• Develop a summary brief of Child justice related recommendations from the Criminal Justice Policy Assessment report.
• Initiate a network/platform of child justice alumni (short and long course) for ongoing learning and experience exchange.
• Support MINJUST to initiate the pilot on probation services, with a particular focus on the role of CPWOs in the delivery of juvenile justice.
• Develop a capacity development plan for child protection and justice practitioners in child justice.
• Support an assessment of the current set-up of pro bono legal aid to children for a more effectiveness.
• Quick assessment of ILPD Child Justice program’s impact
• Technical assistance to “pilot” specialized child justice units within justice institutions (RNP, RIB, Prosecution/NPPA and Courts) and NCDA child protection officers
• Facilitation of cross-sectoral coordination between the justice and protection sectors
• Producing comprehensive reports and recommendations to the Ministry of Justice on progress, challenges, and lessons learned.

 

Deliverables/Outputs

Payment 1: 16%

1. Child justice related summary brief
2. Functioning platform with ToR and SoPs
3. ToR for development of diversion programme drafted and approved.
4. Diversion programme design undertaken through consultative process with Justice and Child Protection stakeholders.

Payment 2: 16%

5. Develop a training manual for the judiciary on alternatives to detention.
6. Diversion programme, as approved, tested and piloted in 2-3 districts.
7. Carry out a nationwide service mapping for community-based services that can form part of non-custodial sentencing.

Payment 3: 16%

8. Participatory probational services concept note.
9. Draft probation services operational Plan
10. Capacity development plan

Payment 4: 16%

11. Assessment report for set-up of pro bono legal aid to children
12. Assessment report od ILPD Child Justice program’s impact.

Payment 5: 16%

13. ToRs of specialized units
14. Specialized unit implementation plan

Payment 6: 20%

15. Cross-sectoral coordination report
16. Final report

Duration and Duty Location

This consultancy will be completed within 12 months. The consultant will be based in MINIJUST.

Selection Criteria

Applications shall be assessed based on their technical and financial proposals. Maximum scores for technical and financial applications will be 75% and 25%, respectively.

 

To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have… 

• An advanced university degree (master’s or higher) in Social Work, Law, Psychology or Sociology. A good first degree in the above fields supported by over 10 years’ experience may be considered.
• 10-year Professional work experience in child protection and child justice, preferably at senior or managerial level; experience in social protection, childcare and child policy is an asset.
• Experience in project/programme management and strategy development in the areas of social affairs and development in general.
• Experience in a managerial capacity/senior supervisory role within a government setting, as well as practical experience of coordinating work with several organizations.
• Background/experience in welfare and government Institutions pertaining to child protection and legal issues in Rwanda is a must.
• Sound understanding and past working experience with community development principles and practices.
• Experience in working with Local Government, (I)NGOs or Development Partners is required.
• Ability to work with Government Officials at national and district levels as well as with international and national development partners.
• Fluency in English is required. Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish) or a local language is an asset.

 

For every Child, you demonstrate… 

UNICEF’s values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, Accountability, and Sustainability (CRITAS). 

 To view our competency framework, please visit  here. 

 UNICEF is here to serve the world’s most disadvantaged children and our global workforce must reflect the diversity of those children. The UNICEF family is committed to include everyone, irrespective of their race/ethnicity, age, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, nationality, socio-economic background, or any other personal characteristic.

UNICEF offers reasonable accommodation for consultants/individual contractors with disabilities. This may include, for example, accessible software, travel assistance for missions or personal attendants. We encourage you to disclose your disability during your application in case you need reasonable accommodation during the selection process and afterwards in your assignment. 

UNICEF has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UNICEF, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. UNICEF also adheres to strict child safeguarding principles. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles and will therefore undergo rigorous reference and background checks. Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check. 

Remarks:  

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process. 

Individuals engaged under a consultancy or individual contract will not be considered “staff members” under the Staff Regulations and Rules of the United Nations and UNICEF’s policies and procedures, and will not be entitled to benefits provided therein (such as leave entitlements and medical insurance coverage). Their conditions of service will be governed by their contract and the General Conditions of Contracts for the Services of Consultants and Individual Contractors. Consultants and individual contractors are responsible for determining their tax liabilities and for the payment of any taxes and/or duties, in accordance with local or other applicable laws. 

The selected candidate is solely responsible to ensure that the visa (applicable) and health insurance required to perform the duties of the contract are valid for the entire period of the contract. Selected candidates are subject to confirmation of fully-vaccinated status against SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) with a World Health Organization (WHO)-endorsed vaccine, which must be met prior to taking up the assignment. It does not apply to consultants who will work remotely and are not expected to work on or visit UNICEF premises, programme delivery locations or directly interact with communities UNICEF works with, nor to travel to perform functions for UNICEF for the duration of their consultancy contracts.