6.0 Institutional Reform
1. Vetting
a. Public employees who are personally
responsible for gross human rights
violations or serious crimes under
international law must be excluded
from public service to reestablish
public trust and re-legitimise public
institutions.
b.
c.
Vetting must not be solely on the basis
of group or party affiliation as this
tends to cast the net too wide and to
remove public employees of integrity
who bear no individual responsibility
for past abuses.
In vetting, there is need for a strategic
approach targeting critical areas.
2. Oversight
a. Oversight bodies must be established
to maintain a check on institutions
that may have a bearing on the
enjoyment of rights.
b.
Such agencies should be given as
broad a mandate as possible, which
must be clearly outlined in the
Constitution or any other legislative
text. In principle, there must be
measures that guarantee such bodies
of independence and pluralism,
methods of operation and additional
principles of their semi-judicial
competence.
c.
Oversight bodies must be accessible
to the people, with offices
throughout the country, at least in
every district.
3. Structural and Legal Reform
a. There is need for comprehensive
reform of all state institutions and
agencies.
b.
There is a need to use legal standards
that are compliant to existing
international and regional human
rights mechanisms. This makes sure
that the systems that govern civil
and criminal law live up to the
international norms, e.g. Laws
relating to torture and restitution.
4. Security Sector Reform
a. The security sector “should be
subject to the same standards of
efficiency, equity and accountability
as any other [public] service”.
5. Disarmament, Demobilization
and Reintegration Strategies
a. There is need to put in place DDR
to deal with previously armed or
militia groups.
6. Demilitarisation
a. A comprehensive process must be
undertaken to demilitarize civilian
institutions like the Ministr y
National Transitional Justice Working Group Zimbabwe
23
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