Andrew Mitchell MP, Shadow International Development Secretary, files another update on Project Umubano.
I’ve just had an update from the Project Umubano justice team that’s based in Sierra Leone for the duration of our project. A group of six solicitors, barristers and magistrates are taking our project across the continent and working with their local counterparts to help develop the West African country’s justice sector. Led by David Mundell MP, they are bringing their skills, expertise and experience from previous Project Umubano work to bear. Sierra Leone is very different from Rwanda in many respects, but as a post-conflict country it also faces a number of the same challenges with very limited human and financial resources.
The team tells me that following their initial briefings, kindly provided by the British diplomatic, development and military representatives in Freetown, the core of their work is underway and keeping them on their toes – not to mention the regular torrential downpours of Sierra Leone’s peak rainy season!
With the majority of Sierra Leone’s limited number of lawyers based in Freetown, vast swathes of Sierra Leoneans are left with severely limited access to legal help. However, the team has come across a country-wide network of 35 paralegals – supported by a local NGO called TIMAP (loosely translated from the local language, Krio, as ‘Stand Up For Justice’), who provide legal advice and assistance to communities outside the capital. So over the fortnight the team are running a series of mediation and advocacy workshops in rural areas for these paralegals.
The team have also been planning workshops and seminars with the Bar Association and the High Court and this is going incredibly well. Their schedule for the fortnight is filled with a range of work from advising on a bail policy for the country, through helping develop plans for a new commercial court, to improving access to legal texts and online resources for Freetown’s lawyers.
Just as Project Umubano in Rwanda is a two-way learning experience for all involved, we’re confident that the project’s extension to Sierra Leone will be the same.
Other blogs we have posted from Rwanda: Andrew Mitchell, Alistair Burt, Nick Hurd and Robert Halfon.
