Deadline: 20 June, 2022

Location: Pretoria, South Africa

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is seeking to fill the role of Associate Protection Officer.

The UNHRC is a UN agency mandated to aid and protect refugees and stateless people, and assist in their voluntary repatriation, local integration or resettlement.

Responsibilities

• Stay abreast of political, social, economic and cultural developments that have an impact on the protection environment
• Promote international and national law as applicable to UN/UNHCR and IASC policy, standards and codes of conduct
• Observe and respect to protection-related standard operating procedures (SOPs) including helpline SOPs
• Provide technical guidance and technical supervision, functional and administrative support to the helpline staff
• Provide functional and administrative support in implementing participatory approaches, needs assessments, monitoring, reporting and case management
• Support and monitor high-risk case identification through the helpline
• Facilitate liaison with partners and competent authorities for protection responses
• Assist in Digital CwC efforts including maintaining the help.org page for South Africa, developing a help page for Namibia, Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho and the Indian Ocean Islands
• Support Digital CwC outreach by supporting the office to launch the WhatsApp turn.io pilot in South Africa
• Assist the countries covered under SAMCO with service mapping repository
• Assist in drafting reports, routine correspondence, maintain data for trends analysis, updating relevant databases and compiling statistics within the area of responsibility (AoR).
• Enforce integrity in the delivery of protection services by local implementing partners
• Provide legal advice and guidance on protection issues to persons of concern
• Liaise with competent authorities to ensure the issuance of personal and other relevant documentation
• Promote and contribute to measures to identify, prevent and reduce statelessness
• Contribute to a country-level child protection plan as part of the protection strategy to ensure programmes use a child protection systems approach
• Contribute to a country-level education plan
• Participate in the organisation and implementation of participatory assessments and methodologies throughout the operations management cycle and promote AGD sensitive programming with implementing and operational partners
• Contribute to and facilitate a programme of results-based advocacy through a consultative process with sectorial and/or cluster partners
• Facilitate effective information management through the provision of disaggregated data on populations of concern and their problems
• Promote and integrate community-based approaches to protection and contribute to capacity-building initiatives for communities and individuals to assert their rights
• Support activities in the area of risk management related to sexual exploitation and abuse, fraud, case-processing, data protection, and human rights due diligence at country level
• Participate in initiatives to capacitate national authorities, relevant institutions and NGOs
• Decide priorities for reception, interviewing and counselling for groups or individuals
• Enforce compliance of staff and implementing partners with global protection policies and standards of professional integrity in the delivery of protection services
• Enforce compliance with, and integrity of, all protection standard operating procedures
• Perform other related duties as required

Requirements

• Three years of relevant experience with bachelor’s degree; two years of relevant experience with postgraduate degree; or one year of relevant experience with doctorate degree
• Professional experience in the area of refugee protection, internal displacement, human rights or international humanitarian law
• Good knowledge of international refugee and human rights law and ability to apply the relevant legal principles
• Field experience, including working directly with communities
• Good I.T. skills, including database management skills

To apply and for more information, click here.

Photo source: UNMISS