National Consultant - Legal Expert for Women's Access to Justice In Bangladesh, Dhaka

Closing date: Wednesday, 6 May 2015

NATIONAL CONSULTANT - LEGAL EXPERT FOR WOMEN'S ACCESS TO JUSTICE IN BANGLADESH: CONSTRAINTS ANALYSIS EXERCISE

Location : Dhaka, BANGLADESH

Application Deadline : 06-May-15

Additional Category: Democratic Governance

Type of Contract : Individual Contract

Post Level : National Consultant

Languages Required : English

Duration of Initial Contract : (25 working days over a period of 2 months)

Expected Duration of Assignment : 25 working days

Background

Women living in poverty are facing various constraints in accessing justice in Bangladesh. Some of the obstacles relate directly to their lack of financial resources - the cost of legal advice, administrative fees and other collateral costs. Other obstacles, including lack of access to information, arise out of inequality and structural discrimination against the poorest and most marginalized. Furthermore, institutional and systemic obstacles are found in the ideology, design and operation of justice system that create barriers for the poor at all stages of the justice chain.(The justice chain is the series of steps that a person has to take to access the formal justice system, or to claim her rights. UN Women, 2011, pp. 11-12.) These include the inadequate capacity and resources of courts, police and prosecution corps, normative impediments embedded in the legal code, and the location of courts and police stations. Several technical exercises and studies have taken pace to identify the major barriers accessing the justice services by the women living in poverty in rural and urban households and also to design the recommendations and measures to be taken to address this issue.

In this context, UNDP is planning to undertake a study on 'Women's Access to Justice in Bangladesh: Constraint Analysis Exercise' to analyse the main barriers in accessing justice by women. The objectives of the study are to:

• Conduct assessment of the constraints faced by women justice seekers in Bangladesh;
• Identify barriers for women's access to justice which can be addressed in three-five years.; and
• Analyze results of awareness campaigns and other similar efforts by various stakeholders engaged in improving access to justice for women in Bangladesh.

Duties and Responsibilities

Scope of Work

The consultant should complete

• A consolidated desk review of both Bangla and English knowledge products (including surveys, reviews, assessments, evaluations, reports etc.) focusing exclusively on women's access to justice as well as barriers/constraints to women's access to justice (both rural and urban) with solid policy recommendations as well as practical measures to translate recommendations into project activities; and
• A desk review of awareness campaigns and efforts by the government, CSOs/NGOs, academia, media, corporate social responsibility (CSR), donors etc. on women's legal empowerment and legal awareness focusing on both rural and urban women. Based on the desk review, analysis and findings, design a broad 5 year awareness campaign/plan and a specific 1 year awareness campaign/plan (complete with budget) for the women's access to justice programme.

Expected Outputs and Deliverables

1. a detailed action plan of the assignment; (2 days)
2. an analysis of the constraints to women's access to justice in rural and urban areas of Bangladesh; (5 days)
3. an analysis of practical interventions (studies, surveys, awareness campaign both in English and Bangla) by the government, CSOs/NGOs, academia, media, corporate social responsibility (CSR), development partners on women's legal empowerment and legal awareness focusing on women living in rural and urban areas of Bangladesh; (5 days)
4. Mapping of CSO/ NGO interventions in legal aid at national and grass roots levels in Bangladesh (5 days)
5. recommendations and practical measures to address selected barriers for access to justice ( that can be addressed in three-five years); and (3 days)
6. a broad 5 year awareness campaign costed workplan including a specific 1 year action plan for the women's access to justice programme. (5 days)

Supervision and Performance Evaluation

The contracted consultant will report to Programme Analyst, Justice and Human Rights, Democratic Governance Cluster, UNDP, who will also carry out a performance evaluation at the end of the assignment. Further, the work of the consultant will be coordinated by the designated staff of the project.

Time Frame and deadline

The assignment must be completed by 25 working days.

Tentative Payment Schedule

• 40 % of the contract value will paid after submission of detailed action plan and completion of the desk review and upon certification by UNDP Contract Administrator.
• 40 % of the contract value will paid after submission upon the 5 year awareness campaign/ activity plan too address the constraint of the access to justice for women and upon certification by UNDP Contract Administrator.
• 20% of the contract value will paid after submission of the costed action plan and implementation strategy for the women's access to justice programme and upon certification by UNDP Contract Administrator..

Competencies

Core Competencies

• Focuses on result for the client
• Creative and result-oriented
• Demonstration of leadership
• Ability to perform work of confidential nature and handle a large volume of work
• Ability to work under pressure in a challenging and complex environment
• Demonstrates openness to change
• Responds positively to feedback and differing points of view
• Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive attitude
• Proven communication skills to work with multi-cultural team
• Independent and flexible
• Excellent communication skills
• Proven leadership skills for diverse multi-cultural teams
• Sound knowledge of relevant information resources
• Excellent organizational skills

Corporate Competencies

• Demonstrates commitment to UNDP's mission, vision and values.
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability
• Familiar with and shares the vision of human development as laid out in the flagship HDR series

Functional Competencies

• Encourages Knowledge Sharing and Learning
• Disseminates specialized knowledge and experience
• Actively works towards continuing personal learning and development in one or more Practice Areas, acts on learning plan and applies newly acquired skills

Development and Operational Effectiveness

• Able to perform a variety of standard specialized and non-specialized tasks and work processes that are fully documented, researched, recorded and reported
• Able to review a variety of data, identify and adjust discrepancies, identify and resolve operational problems
• Able to perform work of confidential nature and handle a large volume of work
• Has good knowledge of financial rules and regulations.
• Able to provide input to business processes re-engineering, implementation of new system.

Leadership and Self-Management

• Focuses on result for the client
• Has demonstrable leadership skill.
• Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive attitude
• Remains calm, in control and good humoured even under pressure
• Demonstrates openness to change
• Responds positively to feedback and differing points of view

Other Competencies

• Excellent oral and written communication skills in English and extensive computer literacy

Required Skills and Experience

Academic Qualification

• Master's degree in Law from recognized university.

Professional Qualification

• A minimum of 5 years of relevant professional experience in governance/rule of law/ legislative reforms/human rights issues;
• A minimum 2 years working experience of conducting analytical research, legal research and programme designing, policy and campaign work focusing on access to justice for women, violence against women and Human Rights issues in Bangladesh.
• A minimum 2 Years of demonstrated working experience and at least two research publications on human rights with national and international organizations;
• Proven knowledge and skills on quantitative research applicable in the context of development interventions;
• Knowledge of current issues and innovation in trends, principles, and methodology of research;
• Knowledge and experience working with the government and development partners.
• Excellent analytical and writing skills.

Evaluation of the Candidate

The candidates will be evaluated through Cumulative Analysis method. When using the weighted scoring method, the award of the contract should be made to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:

• Responsive/compliant/acceptable and;
• Having received the highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the solicitation.
• *Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 70% ( 49 out 70 Marks) in technical evaluation will be considered eligible for financial evaluation

Technical Evaluation Criteria (Total 70 marks)

• Academic Qualification - 20 marks
• Relevant professional experience in Governance/rule of law/ legislative reform/human rights - 15 marks
• Working experience of conducting analytical research, legal research and programme designing, policy and campaign work focusing on Access to Justice for women, Violence Against Women and Human Rights and issues in Bangladesh- 15 marks.
• Demonstrated years of working experience and research publications on human rights with national and international organizations- 20 marks

Financial Evaluation (Total 30 marks)

All technically qualified proposals will be scored out 30 based on the formula provided below. The maximum points (30) will be assigned to the lowest financial proposal. All other proposals receive points according to the following formula: p y ( - /z)

Where: p points for the financial proposal being evaluated

y maximum number of points for the financial proposal

- price of the lowest priced proposal

z price of the proposal being evaluated

Documents to be included when submitting the proposal

Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications:

• Detailed concept note including goal, objective, methodologies and work plan
• CV

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence.