Justice For All-PF Ethiopia, Addis Ababa University, and the Federal Justice and Law Institute signed a memorandum of understanding on November 22, 2023, for the development of an Afan Oromo legal dictionary.
Samuel Kifle (Ph.D.), President of Addis Ababa University noted that
“The agreement we signed today helps to make justice more accessible, to prevent citizens from suffering injustice due to the lack of language; He added that, since Afan Oromo is a widely spoken language in our country and East Africa, the development of Afan Oromo legal dictionary will have a significant role in expanding access to justice in a language that is accessible to the community.”
Ambassador Degfe Bula, Director of the Federal Justice and Law Institute also noted that
“Our law school graduates find employment in a variety of law enforcement and justice sectors. As a result, we have observed that issues with legal language in the workplace are leading to major problems and disagreements in the justice system of our nation. The Afan Oromo legal dictionary that we have agreed to develop today will be developed with the same level of quality and attention to detail as the Amharic legal dictionary that is now being developed. These legal dictionaries will support us in our efforts to provide legal access to justice once we are able to put them into effect and make use of them.”
Pr. Daniel G. Selasie, President of Justice for All PF Ethiopia in his speech
“JFA-PFE has been supporting the development of the justice sector in various capacities including the development of an Amharic bilingual legal dictionary, which is on the verge of completion. He added that there are frequent issues with word definitions in our nation’s judicial system, which leads to several cases that end up before the Supreme Court. The legal dictionaries in Amharic and Afan Oromo that we signed today will help improve the efficiency of the legal system, uphold the rule of law nationally, and benefit our law schools by expanding their scope of knowledge.
Beyond the legal system and academic institutions, I think this legal dictionary will improve connections between people.
