What justice problems organizations-applicants addressed to Kyiv Legal Empowerment Practical Programme this year? What are the eligibility criteria for the participants?
The call for participation in the Kyiv Legal Empowerment Practical Program (KyivLEPP-2021) was closed last week. 15 teams submitted their applications this year! NGOs, law firms and government agencies from Cameroon, Kenya, Tanzania, Togo, Sierra Leone, Ukraine, Northern Macedonia and Kyrgyzstan.
Despite the remoteness of our countries we’re all on the same page: the legal needs are very similar from country to country. There is a problem with citizenship documentation in Kenya, the Tanzanian team wants to overcome gender based violence. The team from Sierra Leone has raised an issue that worries many Ukrainian women and men, but it is not common to talk about it out loud – the lack of social guarantees for housewives and domestic workers. In Sierra Leone, many women work as domestic workers in other people’s families and such workers have no social guarantees. Moreover, they are often abused during their work. Another team from Tanzania is worried about achieving gender balance in positions where important decisions are made for the country.
Almost all of the applicant teams from Africa reported gaps in ensuring rights of women and girls, and of people with disabilities. One of the applicants’ teams also noted that during the pandemic, the number of cases of gender-based violence increased significantly.
A team from Kyrgyzstan addressed KyivLEPP-2020 with a similar problem last year. To solve it, during the design thinking course, they formed a vision to create a network of paralegals for victims of domestic violence. As a result, the idea has passed the crash test of KyivLEPP-2020 and was successfully implemented this year.
This time the Kyrgyzstan team apply to find a solution to ensure access to justice for vulnerables, taking into account the Ukrainian experience – Community advisers course
A team from Northern Macedonia has applied to develop a solution to address the issue of educational, social, medical care problems of children with disabilities.
KyivLEPP-2021 has also received three applications from Ukraine. Two teams raised the issue of low public awareness of the mechanisms for protecting their rights and proposed different solutions. The third team drew attention to security issues and the need for solutions to address the safety problems of tourists.
The next step of the selection is a video interview with the applicants. Eligibility criteria are:
- Institutional and intersectoral balance of the personal composition of the group.
- Organizational potential of the team (leadership, organization and coherence).
- Awareness of team members about the relevance of the problem and previous experience in solving it.
- The team has a common vision of the essence of the problem (agreed clear wording of the problem and stakeholders).
- The team has a vision for alternative strategies for solving the problem.
- Motivation / willingness to implement a practical solution developed within the course.
- Gender balance of the team.
- Creativity and innovativeness.
Among the bonuses: recommendation letters from the State authorities, and visual materials about the idea.
The five teams with the maximum number of points will have the opportunity to work with experts, develop prototypes to solve legal problems using design thinking methodology, test them during a crash test and implement them with the support of program mentors.
It will be recalled that teams from Argentina, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Poland, Ukraine, Northern Macedonia and Kenya took part in the Kyiv Legal Empowerment Practical Program in 2019-2020. Five KyivLEPP-2020 participating teams put their ideas into practice.
The KyivLEPP program is implemented by the Ukrainian Access to Justice School of Practice through the co-creation of colleagues from the Ukrainian Legal Aid Foundation, the Coordination Center on Legal Aid Provision, the Legal Development Network, the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine, the PRAVOKATOR.Kyiv Law Club and the expert and financial support of the Human rights and justice program of the International Renaissance Foundation.
