United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime

The UNODC Regional Office in East Africa (ROEA)

UNODC Supports Change Management into 21st Century Prosecution Services

Nairobi (Kenya), 8 June, 2021 - The momentous occasion of the launch of the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP), Excellence Charter and Standard Operating procedures for the investigation of serious human rights violations by Police Officers was presided by Cabinet Secretary, Interior, Hon. Dr. Fred Matiang’i as the Chief Guest. Other invited guests included the Court of Appeal President, Hon. Justice Daniel Masinga; Director of Public Prosecutions, Noordin Haji, Inspector-General of Police, Hilary Mutyambai, Law Society of Kenya (LSK), Nelson Havi and UNODC’S Regional Head of the Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice Programme, Charity Kagwi among other eminent guests.

The Excellence Charter is the roadmap which will guide the ODPP for the period 2020 to 2023.  The Charter outlines the ODPP’s strategic commitments, priorities, and milestones.  Similarly, it harmonizes the implementation and realization of the ODPP strategic focus. The EU supported the ODPP’s transformative vision through the Programme for Legal Empowerment and Aid Delivery in Kenya (PLEAD) Partnership, whose team supported the ODPP Strategic Planning Committee with drafting the Excellence Charter. This team included two international consultants with expertise in change management and business process engineering for criminal justice institutions.

To meet ODPP’s specific needs, PLEAD also supported in the development of the Road Map to Change containing the necessary initiatives to realise the strategic commitments contained in the Charter. These were built, inter alia, on concept notes drafted to optimise the potential of existing initiatives within ODPP, such as operationalization of the PTI, enhancing alternatives to prosecution initiatives and proposals to improve on ODPP’s business processes. To this end, PLEAD supported a number of consultative meetings, including a strategic planning conference that was organized in conjunction with the ODPP's Strategic Planning Committee in August 2019.

Mr. Noordin Haji noted that the Charter adopted a three-pronged approach that is; Recasting, Retooling and Relearning, whereby the Re-Tooling strategy focused on strengthening and growing the existing ODPP infrastructure while the Re-Learning strategy focused on equipping staff with requisite skills and capabilities necessary to deliver the ODPP mandate.

Mr. Haji underscored the transformative innovations within the Excellence Charter as the beginning of what could be achieved, and further acknowledged and appreciated support in the development and publication of the Excellence Charter from the EU and the UNODC, who he dubbed as the Biggest Donors to the ODPP. 

“I laud the ODPP for blazing the trail in the development of the Excellence Charter, as no other justice and security sector institution in Kenya had developed one.” Dr. Matiang’I underscored.

Hon. Musinga was delighted of ODPP’s commitment to the culture of accountability, transparency and quality service delivery. He firmly believed that the charter would enable the ODPP to put in place requisite tools and infrastructure to ensure the prosecutor’s office is accessible to the public, accountable, independent and transparent. He accentuated that the Charter was an important milestone which spoke volumes of the ODPP’s commitment to discharge its constitutional mandate. “Success of justice actors depends on the efficacy of inter-agency collaboration and individual strengthening of systems.” He emphasized.

The ODPP Excellence Charter, directly linked to the sixteenth Sustainable Development Goal: the promotion of Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions, was termed as an exemplary instance of commitment to change which improved service delivery and justice reforms.

UNODC through Ms. Charity Kagwi commended the ODPP in developing the Excellence Charter which looks into 21^st century prosecution services and accountability noting that UNODC supported the technical development of the strategic vision. “It is only the beginning and we are committed to working with the ODPP on a much greater journey,” she underlined.  Ms. Kagwi acknowledged the DPP for endorsing the contribution by the UNODC to support the development of Goal 16 in strengthening institutions and justice for all.

PLEAD is currently supporting a number of initiatives proposed within the Charter, including provision of technical support in the operationalization of the Prosecution Training Institute through development of the 1-year Induction Curriculum and training manuals; development and operationalization of diversion and plea bargaining guidelines as alternatives to prosecution and trial; support in the review of the Human Resource Manual and hardware support though purchase of ICT equipment and furniture.

Link to the publications:

-       http://www.odpp.go.ke/download/3886/

-       https://www.unodc.org/easternafrica/plead/office-of-the-director-of-public-prosecutions.html

For more information, please contact: 

Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions - info@odpp.go.ke

European Union - 0708 116 120 / delegation-kenya-press@eeas.europa.eu

UN Office on Drugs and Crime –  unodc-plead@un.org