“Justice Access Forum” getting closer the citizens with justice institutions

Gjakova, October 4, 2013 – Today, Movement FOL, within the project “Getting closer people to justice institutions”, which is funded by the American people through USAID / ATRC, held the second meeting of the “Justice Access Forum” in Gjakova municipality. Participants at the meeting were representatives of the Court, Prosecution, Police, from Ombudsman, Legal Assistance Centre, representatives from Chamber of Attorneys, NGOs, media and interested citizens of the municipality of Gjakova. Present at this meeting was also the representative of the Kosovo Judicial Council Aishe Qorraj-Berisha.

Initially, Kenan Torah from Movement FOL welcomed the participants and made a brief presentation of the first meeting of the forum and other activities which aim to improve the communication between citizens and justice institutions. He mentioned the difficulties that are encountered during attempts to monitor hearing sessions, and that so far, in the Basic Court in Gjakova was not held any hearings on the cases of misuse of public funds or corruption. He stressed the need to increase the level and quality of communication between citizens and justice institutions.

Aishe Qorraj-Berisha, representative from KJC, encouraged FOL Movement for their ideas and commitment in this area. She presented the overall performance of the KJC h and also mentioned and acknowledged the problems and challenges of the judiciary starting with low budget, lack of judges and the large number of cases. She further mentioned that in Gjakova they don’t have an official on public relations that would facilitate communication with citizens, although each court has the monitor where hearings data are presented.

After that Lulzim Paqarizi from the Basic Court in Gjakova said that courts are in a transitional phase. There are too many cases but there are not enough judges, there are no sufficient human resources that we would complete all the cases presented in court. He further added that the Basic Court in Gjakova has 14 judges, Rahovec Court has six judges and Malisheva Court has five judges. He also noted that there is no Detention Center in Gjakova. There are 17 cases on corruption and abuse of authority in the Basic Court in Gjakova, but they are assigned for trial yet.

Nora Dobruna from the Legal Assistance Council said that communication between courts and judges with citizens, each day is improved more and more. Citizens mainly express disappointment over the delay of cases.

While discussing, Ali Juniku, a citizen from Gjakova expressed disappointment about the length of his case in court and said that courts are corrupted and that corruption is the reason of the bad performance of the courts.

Vjollca Kuqi from Women Network ” Qeliza ” said that courts communication with citizens is poor and this is because of the excessive bureaucracy.
Halil Kaja from the Center for Business and Community Development expressed his concern about the phenomenon of racketeering in Gjakova, which according to him each day more and more is harmin business and entrepreneurship.
At the end, Linda Sada from Civil Society Forum asked that Justice Access Forum should be held regularly, as it is obvious that there is a need to improve the level of communication between citizens and justice institutions.