Outline of the Project

Project name

The Project for Harmonized, Practical Legislation and Uniform Application of Law Targeting Year 2020 (PHAP LUAT 2020)

Summary of the Project

a) Project purpose

1. The establishment of methods and systems for examination of legal normative documents at OOG as well as review, post-checking and law enforcement monitoring of legal normative documents at MOJ is promoted in order to ensure consistency and uniform implementation and application of legal normative documents.
2. The establishment of foundation for the implementation of the civil code-related legal normative documents and court practice on civil and criminal cases is promoted.
3. Mid-to-long term activities in the field of law and justice which need to be conducted after 2021 are shared among implementing organizations.

b) Project term
April 1, 2015 – December 31, 2020 (5 years and 9 months)

c) Implementing Organization
Ministry of Justice (MOJ), Office of Government (OOG), Supreme People's Court (SPC), Supreme People's Procuracy (SPP), Vietnam Bar Federation (VBF)

Project team

a) YOKOMAKU Kosuke (Long-term Expert)
1997 Graduated from Waseda University, Faculty of law (LL.B)
2001 Appointed to a Public prosecutor
Deal with criminal cases in District Public Prosecutor's Offices (Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka, Kushiro and Gifu prefecture)
2013 International Cooperation Department (ICD), Research and Training Institute (RTI), Ministry of Justice (MOJ), Japan
2016 JICA Legal Long Term Expert (Indonesia)
2018 Tokyo District Public Prosecutor'Office
2019 Present Post after ICD, RTI, MOJ, Japan

b) EDAGAWA Mitsushi (Long-term Expert)
1994 Graduated from Tokyo University, Faculty of Literature (B.A.)
1994 Staff of JICA
2007 Graduated from Nagoya University, Graduate School of Law (J.D.)
2009 Admitted to Japan Federation of Bar Association and Tokyo Bar Association, Attorney-at-law
2016 Senior Adviser to Industrial Development and Public Policy Division, JICA HQ/ Attorney-at-law admitted in Japan
2018 Legal Expert of JICA for the Project for Harmonized, Practical Legislation and Uniform Application of Law Targeting Year 2020 (PHAP LUAT 2020) in Vietnam

c) NAGAHASHI Masanori
2007 Graduated from Nagoya University, Department of Law and Political Science, School of Law (Bachelor)
2009 Obtained Juris Doctor (professional) Degree from Nagoya University Law School
2011 Assistant Judge
Dealt with civil cases (including administrative litigations and bankruptcy cases) , criminal cases in District court (Osaka, Naha) and juvenile criminal cases in Family court (Tokyo)
2017 Studied at Peter A.Allard school of Law in The University of British Columbia in Vancouver as a Visiting Scholar
2018 International Cooperation Department, Research and Training Institute, Ministry of Justice, Japan
2019 Present post

d) TERAMOTO Tsugunori (Project Coordinator)
1981 Hokkaido University, School of Engineering
Working for private company (coal mine)
1999 JICA Expert (safety control in coal mine)
2011 Present post

e) Vũ Thanh Thủy (Staff)
2012 Hanoi Law University (LL.B.)
2017 Nagoya University, School of Law (LL.M.)
2017 Staff of JICA for the Project for Harmonized, Practical Legislation and Uniform Application of Law Targeting Year 2020(PHAP LUAT 2020) in Vietnam

f) Nguyễn Thị Thu Hà (Program Officer)
1994 College of Foreign Languages, VNU Hanoi (B.A)
1998 Foreign Trade University (Bachelor of Economics)
2004 Faculty of Law, VNU Hanoi (LL.B)

g) Lê Cẩm Hương (Program Officer)
2006 Hanoi University (B.A)

h) Nguyễn Thị Huyền Nhung (Program Officer)
2005 College of Foreign Languages, VNU Hanoi (B.A)

i) Đào Thị Liên (Clerical Staff)

Project Office (MAP)

#1004, 10th Floor, Daeha Business Center
No.360 Kim Ma St., Ba Dinh Dist.
Hanoi, Vietnam
Tel: 024 3942 6558
Fax: 024 3942 6561

Background of the Project

Since adopting "Doi Moi policy" in 1986, Vietnamese government has enhanced the transition to a market economy, and developed its legal systems accordingly as a part of policies of openness. In 2005, the Resolution No. 48-NQ/TW and No.49-NQ/TW of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party were announced, and Judicial Reform has proceeded concretely from then on.

JICA operated several technical assistance projects, such as "Legal Technical Assistance Project (phase 1) (1996 – 1999)" and subsequent phases of the same project (2000 – 2003 and 2003 – 2007), aiming to support legislative drafting work in civil and economic areas, and to achieve capacity development for legal practitioners in relevant organizations. During these terms, the above phases achieved certain results, for example, revised Civil Code (June 2005), revised Civil Procedure Code (November 2004) and manuals for legal practitioners that were jointly made by Japanese experts and partner organizations. At the scene where enacted new Legal Normative Documents (LNDs) were actually applied, however, relevant officers often faced difficulties on understanding and applying new LNDs properly, and the necessity for improving quality of actual practices at field level, such as adjudication work or law enforcement practice was still recognized. Thus, "Legal and Judicial System Reform Project (Phase 1)" had been operated from April 2007 to March 2011 together with MOJ, SPC, SPP and VBF (joined from 2009) as counterpart organizations (C/Ps). Continuously, phase 2 of this project ("Phase 2") was conducted from April 2011 to March 2015 in order to accomplish a favorable situation where central judicial authorities/organizations achieve improved institutional and human resource capacities to grasp the challenges in practices nationwide, establish the countermeasures to overcome those challenges, and incorporate these countermeasures into their workflow.

The terminal evaluation team of Phase 2 confirmed that certain results were found in improvement of local practices of C/Ps, especially in the areas selected as "Advanced Activities Area" where central level authorities/organizations and local level authorities/organizations had a good communication in order to abstract the actual challenges in practice and to come up with countermeasures to these challenges. On the other hand, the above team also confirmed that there was still a problem in the practices of other administrative authorities of other areas, especially at local level, in unified understanding and application of LNDs, and pointed out a further room for improvement in the drafting work and implementation of LNDs conducted by legal and judicial authorities. Therefore, as the subsequent project of Phase 2, JICA has decided to launch the new project "The Project for Harmonized, Practical Legislation and Uniform Application of Law Targeting Year 2020 (PHAP LUAT 2020)" aiming to support Judicial Reform Strategy of Vietnam based on pre-existing results of cooperation in the past.

"PHAP LUAT 2020", in anticipation of the target year 2020 for Legal and Judicial Reform in Vietnam, takes an approach that puts on a stress to establish new partnership between Vietnam and Japan after this project ends as well as keeping comprehensive and developmental cooperation based on the various reforms rooted from new Constitution 2013. Besides, bearing in mind that Japanese Official Development Assistance (ODA) to Vietnam that has been showing rapid economic growth is requested to contribute to the creation of favorable business environment, JICA welcomes the Office of the Government (OOG) as a new C/P in this project in addition to pre-existing 4 C/Ps, and decides to get involved in activities aiming to minimize and rectify obstructive factors for doing business in Vietnam.