In December 1998, the OCFJA was named Executive Agent of a $5 million Judicial Cooperation Project with Ethiopia. This project was temporarily put on hold due to border conflicts with Eritrea.

In July 2000, the OCFJA and CIDA entered into negotiations with a view of finalizing an Administrative Arrangement. Given the stabilization of the political situation in Ethiopia, this agreement was later signed by both parties.

This five year project seeks to contribute to the stability, security and sustained development of Ethiopia by promoting practices that will help achieve and sustain the rule of law. It further seeks to reduce the administrative inefficiencies and delays of Ethiopian courts by strengthening the management and administrative capacity of the courts through the introduction of new practices, procedures and technologies.

The project will focus on the following tasks;

1. To assist the Federal Supreme Court in the study, review, design, development and implementation of sub-projects in the following areas: planning, monitoring and evaluation; utilization of resources and requirements; computer systems; judgment executions; public defense; case flow management.

2. To replicate in the Federal First Instance Court the measures detailed in the preceding paragraph, as well as the reforms introduced in the Federal Supreme Court in Phase 1 of the Court Administration Reform Project. Those measures included the following: organizational structure; executive and change management; management information system; training needs analysis; recording and transcribing; record keeping; salary scale levels; and to support the development of the autonomy of courts.

3. To replicate in the Federal High Courts the measures detailed for the Federal First Instance Court.

4. To replicate in one or two target Regional State Courts, Zonal and/or Woreda State Courts, and possibly in other states, the reform measures contemplated for the federal courts.

5. To develop the Ethiopian capacity to manage and implement a process of court administration reform, particularly at the regional court level, whereby the design and implementation of the reform measures are led by a team of Ethiopian legal and management specialists, who are able to utilize the systems and procedures developed in the federal courts, at the regional court level. This process will gradually devolve, over the course of the project, responsibility for the implementation of the project to the Ethiopian management team.

The priorities and approaches in the development and implementation of the above tasks were adopted during the Inception Mission, which took place in November 2000.

A two week Study Tour to Canada was organized for twelve Ethiopian Judges and Court Administrators in April 2001.

The first Steering Committee was held in Addis Ababa in February 2001, and the second one took place in Bahir Dar, Ethiopia in December 2001.