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Justice Sector Corruption in Ethiopia 185
• More proactive approaches. These same offices might fight corruption
more proactively instead of waiting for complaints to be filed. Automated
databases and further analysis could identify emerging problems, problematic
actors, and areas requiring more citizen education. Agencies,
including the ethics and anticorruption commissions, should develop
more explicit strategies to address issues. Having proved they can
investigate and prosecute corruption once it is reported, they must now
create stronger disincentives by organizing their own inspections.
• Greater clarity on personnel policies. Especially in the courts, which
receive the most criticism here, personnel policy reform is long overdue.
As the courts are already considering, recruitment should be advertised,
candidates should be ranked on explicit criteria, and lists of final
nominees should be published before their appointments. The same is
true of transfers and promotions.
• Better self-policing by the bar. Independent bar associations should be
encouraged to police their own members instead of relying only on the
ministry and bureaus of justice for this role. In the best of worlds, the bar
associations would also be invited to evaluate judges and prosecutors.
• Improvement of internal performance monitoring systems. To combat corruption
and improve performance, the police and prosecutors need to
improve their internal monitoring systems along the lines of the judiciary’s
case management system (CMS).
• Greater admission of the problem overall. All agencies should admit that
corruption remains a problem, if not a major one, and give it the same
emphasis as other goals. Understandably, the courts do not want to
admit any degree of corruption, thus possibly subjecting themselves to
outside interference. However, admitting a problem while outlining a
program to resolve it indicates that an agency is on top of the matter.
Chapter Structure
The next sections provide the broad context for the sector study: background
about the Ethiopian justice sector and a discussion of the importance
and usual types of corruption that affect the justice value chain.
Further analysis follows in three parts:
• “Corruption and Intervention in Ethiopia’s Justice Sector,” which relates
the study’s findings in the context of the value chain
• “Conclusions on Justice Sector Corruption in Ethiopia,” a comparative
analysis in light of other country studies and the perspectives of
participants interviewed for this study