Support for strengthening the strategic thinking capacities of RCN J&D and its partners & Support for the development of the strategic plan At RCN Justice and Democracy

Presentation of the NGO and the context:

Presentation of RCN Justice & Democracy

RCN Justice & Démocratie (RCN J&D) is a Belgian NGO created in 1994, active in supporting justice and conflict prevention. RCN J&D defends the idea that justice is a pillar of living together, a lever for social transformation and that there are a plurality of models of justice. To serve society and individuals, justice must adapt to the social, economic and cultural contexts in which it is deployed, it must be accessible to all and establish positive standards and practices guaranteeing freedoms and equality before the court. law.

This vision of justice pushes us to value, beyond the judicial response, all the mechanisms capable of lastingly resolving conflicts and meeting the reparation needs of victims (mediation-conciliation, restorative justice, transitional justice, etc.) . In the context of African societies, the NGO pays particular attention to legal pluralism (law/custom), to a constructive articulation between customary justice and judicial justice and to the development of a justice system that is more honest and respectful of human rights. RCN J&D also carries out work on the memory of international crimes and more broadly on raising awareness of conflict prevention.

Our levers of action:

• Act towards justice actors to improve their capacities and their sense of responsibility
• Support the empowerment of citizens and civil society actors in order to know, defend and claim their rights, duties and responsibilities
• Create meeting spaces between justice professionals, civil society, administrative and customary authorities and the population in order to collaborate and exchange their expectations with a view to improving their respective practices in matters of justice
• Conduct analyses, studies and advocacy for the improvement of normative frameworks and justice policies

History and evolution of interventions

The NGO is currently active in 6 countries: Belgium, Burundi, Burkina Faso, Morocco, Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda.

RCN J&D’s expertise in the justice sector is based on 29 years of experience, mainly in Africa, particularly in the Great Lakes countries. During these years, the organization has undergone several significant developments, summarized below:

From emergency justice to development justice. Since its creation in 1994, RCN J&D’s expertise has grown and evolved. If initially the activities were strongly linked to the post-conflict situation (restoration of justice, support for prosecutions and other transitional justice activities), the organization added more and more activities linked to local justice, with the aim of contributing to sustainable development (access to land, gender equality, access to justice, peaceful resolution of conflicts, respect for fundamental rights, etc.).

From formal justice to plural justice. Initially, activities were strongly oriented towards strengthening the formal justice system. The societal approach and consideration of the context have never been absent from RCN J&D’s approach. The organization’s interventions are based on an observation: there are a multitude of complementary conflict prevention and resolution mechanisms: thus, justice is understood in the broad sense – institutions of justice (judicial system, magistrates, etc.). .) to the local and community mechanisms available to litigants to regulate their conflicts and problems on a daily basis.

From civil and political rights to socio-economic rights. If the activities were initially very strongly focused on respect for the fundamental freedoms of citizens, the socio-economic dimension emerged as a factor to be taken into account, also for the prevention of violent conflicts and development. For around ten years, RCN J&D has placed emphasis on land security, particularly that of women.

From access to justice to citizen participation. By working on the supply (support for institutions) and demand for justice (support for civil society and litigants), RCN J&D aims to improve access to justice. In recent years, it has proven necessary to further strengthen the interaction between supply and demand, to strengthen citizen participation in the development and implementation of justice policies to strengthen legitimacy, effectiveness and accountability of justice.

From South activities to the development of North-South activities. Initially, RCN J&D’s activities took place only in post-conflict countries. During the first Rwanda trial in Belgium (see below), RCN J&D realized the importance of making the link between the conflicts taking place in the South and the development of an awareness of these conflicts, their causes and consequences with the public in Belgium, as well as the impact of these conflicts on the diaspora from these countries.

It is through very diverse activities that RCN J&D has been able to accumulate 29 years of experience in justice matters in Africa and Belgium:

In Rwanda, RCN J&D has been present and active with its partners since October 1994 where the organization notably intervened in support of the Rwandan judicial system in the resolution of the genocide dispute: training, support for confession procedures, “liberation of the speech”, etc. For around ten years RCN J&D has also supported common law justice, such as the reduction of judicial arrears, support for land reform, the training of Abunzi (mediators), etc.

RCN J&D has been operating in the Democratic Republic of Congo since 2000 . The association currently supports and works with several civil society organizations in the field of justice in order to contribute to plural justice, more honest and respectful of fundamental rights. RCN J&D supports alternative methods of conflict resolution as well as traditional leaders in their role as conciliators, while promoting a more egalitarian place for women in custom and the recognition of their land rights. To promote access to justice for all, support is provided to free consultation offices. Mechanisms to raise awareness and inform litigants on the procedures for seeking legal recourse and on the functioning of justice are also developed. RCN J&D also takes action to combat torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment in various places of detention. The fight against corruption in the judicial system is also one of our priority interventions. In view of the conflict situations in the DRC and the international crimes committed there, RCN J&D and its partners are also interested in mechanisms of transitional justice and the fight against impunity with a view to contributing to the return to social cohesion and building lasting peace. Actions are currently focused on 5 provinces: Kinshasa, North Kivu (Masisi), Ituri (Burnia), Equateur (Mbandaka) and Kasaï (Tshikapa).

In Burundi , RCN J&D developed its activities following the signing of the Arusha Accords in 2001 and has operated throughout the entire national territory since then. The programs developed supported local justice (training for magistrates and judicial police officers, support for mediation, municipal consultations with justice stakeholders, police-prosecutor magistrate workshops, fight against discrimination against albinos, awareness raising, etc.) and the transitional justice process (discussion group based on a play, radio series, civil society coalition, consultative forums, etc.). Since 2017, RCN J&D has supported its partners in the development of programs to combat gender-based violence which aim to improve access to justice for women and girls victims of violence by working on strengthening magistrates within the courts of residence, on the strengthening of community conflict resolution mechanisms, on the support of FFVV and on the transformation of discriminatory norms within communities, in a transformative justice approach . RCN J&D closed its office in Bujumbura in January 2019 and now supports its Burundian partners remotely through a technical and organizational support system.

In connection with activities in Rwanda, RCN J&D developed its first activities in Belgium , in 2001, around the first trial of the four Rwandan accused of international crimes before the Assize Court in Brussels (registration of the trial, promotion of the law on universal jurisdiction, dialogue with the Rwandan diaspora). Following the production of two series of audio interviews with witnesses and actors of mass crimes, a global citizenship education program was established, with activities occasionally organized abroad.

Through its program in Belgium, RCN J&D wants to contribute to the prevention of conflicts and the maintenance of the rule of law. Violence and wars are among the main threats to human development. In this context, it seems essential for RCN J&D to shed light on the dynamics of conflicts and mass crimes and the mechanisms that lead to them in order to better understand their global consequences and to get involved in Belgium and abroad for a fairer world. and in peace. RCN J&D and its partners therefore want to contribute to a better understanding of the overall dynamics of violence and ultimately to their prevention through the fight against discrimination, exclusion, radicalization and polarization.

In Morocco , RCN J&D has supported the Oujda Ain Ghazal Association since 2017, in the implementation of programs to combat gender-based violence in a logic of transformative justice. The approaches developed aim both to transform discriminatory social and judicial attitudes towards women and to strengthen those involved in caring for victims of gender-based violence, in a region, the Oriental, which is among the poorest in the country. RCN J&D does not have an operational office in Morocco and supports the partner from the headquarters in Brussels.

In Burkina Faso , RCN J&D intervenes in the Boucle du Mouhoun and since 2020 has supported the International Center for Sociological Studies and Applied Law (CINESDA) in a conflict prevention program through the promotion and strengthening of accessible local justice and egalitarian. Through this program RCN J&D and CINESDA are working both on the provision of justice (support for the Dédougou High Court, strengthening of MARC by supporting and strengthening the Village Land Commissions and the Village Land Conciliation Commissions but also through the creation of Law Access Centers within rural communities) and on the demand for justice (through raising awareness among rural populations, community dialogues, raising awareness among prisoners of their rights, etc.). RCN J&D does not have an operational office in Burkina Faso and supports the partner from the headquarters in Brussels.

From a single management mode to diversified management modes:

• Originally, RCN J&D worked in the countries of intervention according to a unique management method in a “mission” format with national registration of the INGO, a head of mission and expatriate employees and/or or nationals implementing activities and/or supervising partnership relations with national civil society actors.
• From 2017, thanks to a new partnership in Morocco, RCN J&D has developed a new management method in the “remote partnership supervision” format, that is to say without a team in the countries of intervention and under supervision from the headquarters in Brussels.
• To these two management modes, a hybrid management mode was added from 2020 in the form of “national relays” of RCN J&D via long-term consultants to support partner civil society organizations (CSOs). and play a program supervision role in the countries of intervention.
  1. Challenges in terms of strengthening the strategic capacities of RCN J&D and its civil society partners
• Strengthen the knowledge of RCN J&D teams (headquarters and field) on the tools and methodologies for conducting strategic thinking in order to be fully involved in current strategic thinking, but also to be able to support CSO partners from RCN J&D who wish to update or renew their strategic plan;
• Empower RCN J&D’s CSO partners in Burundi, DRC and Rwanda in terms of strategic thinking in order to enable them to update their strategic plans;
• Strengthen strategic convergences between RCN J&D and partner CSOs to project, in a more assertive egalitarian partnership logic, into a future five-year program 2027-2031 with RCN J&D.

The challenges of RCN J&D in terms of strategic orientation

Consensus elements:

• Expressed need to update the RCN J&D associative project: the formulation of the vision, the mission and the areas of intervention deserve to evolve (a vision expressed in a negative way, “outmoded” terminologies to be changed – such as country in developing countries, countries in transition, give more space to the decolonial issue…);
• The desire to encourage in-depth decolonial reflection in order to question the organization’s modes of intervention and practices, as well as power relations with civil society partners abroad;
• Support the decolonization of law and justice in the countries of the African continent, create alliances and influence strategies to achieve this strategic objective;
• The desire of RCN J&D to strengthen its action in Belgium, and in particular to explore the idea of ​​becoming an actor in justice, here in Belgium.

Strategic nodes:

• The question of the limits of intervention, the specific added value of RCN J&D and the general coherence of the mandate: tendency to extend the scope of themes and very differentiated country trajectories, generating questions from the teams on the core of the organization’s mandate and the coherence of its action;
• The capacity of RCN J&D to continue its justice support programs in the Great Lakes area has become weakened for different contextual reasons, in Rwanda (the PTFs favoring direct support to institutional actors or national civil society) , and in Burundi (withdrawal from the country due to the political and legal context for INGOs), without the organization having fully succeeded in finding the key to its future development in new areas (Morocco, Burkina Faso);
• Equip yourself with a relevant and objective analysis framework to answer the question of maintaining or leaving RCN J&D from certain countries of intervention, but also of involvement in new countries;
• Moving from a diversification of reactive management methods to more rationalized management choices;
• Better understand trends in the justice, development aid and INGO sectors in order to enrich RCN J&D’s partnership policy (alliance logic with INGOs) and adopt a more strategic positioning vis-à-vis the national and international actors involved in the justice sector.

Consultancy objectives

The support sought by RCN J&D aims to:

• Strengthen the strategic thinking capacities of RCN J&D and its civil society partners in Burundi, DRC and Rwanda;
• Support collective reflection to update the fundamentals of RCN J&D (Vision, missions) and to develop the new RCN J&D strategic plan in the medium (5 years) and long (10 years) terms.

Expected deliverables

• Define, in consultation with the steering committee, an inclusive strategic reflection process, specifying the modalities for involving field teams and consulting partner CSOs;
• Produce a framework note at the end of the awareness period including a description of the process and a work plan;
• Facilitate several reflection workshops in Brussels, as well as a reflection workshop in Kigali bringing together the RCN J&D teams and representatives of partner CSOs from Burundi, Rwanda and the DRC; these workshops must include training time on strategic thinking techniques and tools.
• Support RCN J&D in the final drafting of the strategic plan including an institutional theory of change, as well as the main strategic orientations by country [1] ;
• A brief final note describing the overall support achieved.

Profile of the consultant(s)

– Graduates of higher education (Master/Bachelor/Engineer level)

– Professional experience :

• At least 5 years of experience in the international cooperation sector
• At least 5 years of experience in leading and supporting strategic thinking as well as formalizing strategic plans
• A good mastery of participatory approaches and therefore good facilitation-moderation skills for group work sessions
• Excellent mastery of change-oriented strategic thinking techniques
• Rigor and organizational capacity
• Fluency in French, both oral and written

Are a plus:

• Geographic experience in varied terrain, especially in the countries where RCN J&D operates
• Knowledge of the Belgian INGO sector
• Knowledge of international donors supporting the justice and human rights sectors

Indicative steps and timetable

February: Publication of TDRs and submission of offers

Early March: Selection of the offer by RCN J&D and contractualization

March: Framework meeting and proposal for a framework note

April – June: Workshops

June-July: Formalization of the strategic plan

Budget

Financial offers must specify:

• The number of people/days planned detailed by phase/step
• The daily cost requested from consultants
• Details of mission costs: travel, accommodation, stay, etc.

Modality of the call for tenders, selection procedure and deadline

Content of offers

The offer submitted must consist of the following elements:

• the technical offer including:
  • a note of understanding of the terms of reference and presentation of the methodology used (3 pages maximum)
  • the profile of the consultant or team selected, the distribution of responsibilities between its members and the CVs proposed, highlighting experiences related to the purpose of the service;
  • the estimated intervention schedule, as well as an estimate of costs in terms of number of consultancy days
• the financial offer including the overall budget (excluding tax and tax) in euros and the detailed prices (fees, daily allowances, transport, etc.) presented by type of cost, each cost having to be detailed by unit, number of unit and total.
• A sworn declaration signed by a person authorized to hire the candidate company and indicating that it is not in any of the following situations:
  • 1 – Is in a state or is the subject of a procedure of bankruptcy, liquidation, judicial settlement or preventive composition, cessation of activity, or is in any analogous situation resulting from a procedure of the same nature existing in national laws and regulations.
  • 2 – Has been the subject of a conviction pronounced by a judgment having the force of res judicata for any offense affecting their professional morality.
  • 1. Has been the subject of a judgment having the force of res judicata for fraud, within the meaning of Article 1 of the Convention relating to the protection of the financial interests of the European Communities; corruption as defined in Article 3 of the Council Act of May 26, 1997; participation in a criminal organization as defined in Article 2 of Joint Action 98/733/JHA; or any other illegal activity which would harm the financial interests of the European Union.
  • 4 – Is in a conflict of interest situation.

Selection of consultant(s)

Offers will be evaluated based on 3 criteria:

• the quality of the methodological offer (35% of points): understanding of the terms of reference, timeline;
• the qualification, experience and complementarity (if applicable) of the proposed consultant(s) (35%);
• the proposed budget: it is requested to provide a price per consultancy day for the services offered as well as an estimated number of days (30%).
  1. Ethical principles

All bidders undertake to have no conflict of interest relating to the service to be carried out.

The consultancy service must be carried out according to the following ethical principles

• Anonymity and confidentiality
• Responsibility
• Integrity
• Independence

Incidents. If problems arise during the work, they must be immediately reported to RCN J&D, otherwise the existence of such problems cannot under any circumstances be used to justify the impossibility of obtaining the results planned by RCN J&D in the

[1] This does not include the development of country strategic plans.