The “Young Barristers” evaluates a legal proposal to reform   the Prosecutor’s Office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, as the step forward and appeals to the Parliament of Georgia to complete implementation of the package of changes by the end of 2015.

According to the lawyer of the “Young Barristers”, Salome Goglidze,  political will of the Government to implement fundamental changes within the Prosecutor’s Office and law enforcement agencies, will significantly promote implementation of the independent judiciary in the country and protection of the rights of citizens.  The main advantage of the reform, is that the supervisory role of the Parliament will increase, as the Chief Prosecutor and the Head of the State Security Service are going to be accountable to the Parliament, the body, elected by people. Accordingly, social trust towards the  above mentioned agencies, as well as their institutional independence, will increase. The Reform should strengthen justice system as well, as far as, the planned changes within the Prosecutor’s Office, will  promote competitiveness and equality of the parties. In addition, Parliamentary control on the Prosecutor’s Office, will ensure high level of legitimation of the agency.   

According to the appraisal, provided by the “Young Barristers”, in accordance with the represented package of changes, an important part of the planned structural reforms, in both, the Prosecutor’s Office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, refers to the  issue of  election of the leaders. According to the amendments, the Minister of Justice will head the Prosecutor’s Office by means of the Prosecutor’s Council and the authority of appointing Chief Prosecutor will be granted to the Prosecutor’s Council, together with the Government and the Parliament. As for the Ministry of Internal Affairs, it will be  actually divided  into two agencies. The State Security Service will implement activities separately and the Prime Minister will represent the Head of the Agency to the Government, and with the consent of the Government, the Parliament will discuss and approve represented candidacy as the Head of the State Security Service for 6 years term. It is not allowed to re-elect the same person. The person, selected for this position, should be apolitical and continuity of his/her activities will not be depended on the governmental changes, that is very important for conducting effective work and in record of the accountability  to the society as well.

The “Young Barristers” considers, that in case, if within the process of reforming, rule of appointment of the Chief Prosecutor changes, and the control is granted to the Parliament, an issue of electing new Prosecutor  raises automatically,  however, it will be the Parliament , who will select new candidates  for the position. Due to the reason, that the main goal of the reform is to take into account public expectations, it is important to elect leaders in compliance with the new rule, promoting  principles of publicity and transparency of the governance.