DEMOCRACY AND GOVERNANCE FACT SHEET

SUMMARY:

The NETHAM (Order in Arabic), Rule of Law, Justice and Enforcement Program is a 4-year, $13,746,000 USAID-funded program which began in September 2005. It is implemented by DPK Consulting, a division of ARD, Inc. The overarching goals of the program are: 1) to strengthen the capacity of the Palestinian Authority (PA) justice sector institutions, particularly the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) and the Ministry of Justice (MOJ), to administer the rule of law; and 2) to increase public confidence in and awareness of the justice sector, including public outreach and citizen participation.

Goal 1: Strengthening the capacity of the PA justice sector institutions including the Ministry of Justice (MOJ), Supreme Judicial Council (SJC), courts, and other justice sector bodies.

Key activities include:

• Supporting National Justice Sector Strategy implementation.

• Improving case management and reducing case backlog.

• Strengthening the enforcement of laws and courts decisions.

• Establishing the PA Judicial Training Institute.

• Developing policy departments and strategy planning units.

• Addressing anticorruption through financial and administrative reform in the justice sector institutions.

• Training judges, court administrators, and judicial staff.

• Building capacity of justice sector institutions through management training, inspection and oversight departments, and Information Communication Technology tools.

• Assisting with the modernization and upgrading of court automation.

Goal 2: Increasing Public Confidence in the Judiciary through Public Outreach and Citizen Engagement in Rule of Law.

Key activities include:

• Supporting public outreach initiatives that increase the public’s knowledge and respect for the judiciary.

• Working with the Ministry of Education on primary and secondary civic education.

• Partnering with Al Quds law school on a Legal Education Enhancement Program.

• Providing small grants to civil society organizations raising awareness of the rule of law.

• Placing recent graduates in internship programs with the courts.

• Launching activities related to Palestinian Justice Day.

• Supporting television, newspaper, and radio spots to disseminate information on the judiciary.

• Producing educational pamphlets for the public.

Key Program Highlights:

The first-ever Palestinian Authority National Justice Sector strategy was signed. USAID’s rule of law project, Netham, provided technical support to the justice sector ministries in support of the PA’s efforts.

Netham upgraded the Ramallah and Nablus Notary Public Departments (the most publicly accessed departments in the courts) including queuing systems, automated archival and retrieval systems, case filing systems, and renovated waiting rooms. The result is a dramatic increase in public approval and confidence in the system.

Netham helped to connect the 23 court sites across the West Bank to the Supreme Judicial Council through a Wide Area Network (WAN) vastly improving communication and information sharing between the courts.

Partnering with USAID’s youth empowerment program, Netham provided an opportunity for recent college graduates to serve as judicial interns. The interns succeeded in automating and archiving 5,000 files in the Ramallah Civil Judgment Department; 1,220 files in the Nablus Civil Judgment Department; 6,085 in the Jenin Civil Judgment Department; 62,500 files at the Ramallah Notary Public Department; 62,857 files in the Nablus Notary Public; and 4,656 in the Jenin Notary Public Department.