Sub-Saharan Africa

Project: Strengthening Advocacy Capacity of Civil Society in The Gambia
Evaluation Date: December 2013
Report: [report link]
Lesson Learned:

External factors relating to the implementation by the government of civil society legislation limited the impact of joint dialogue between civil society and government in Gambia.  Those local government administrations, which have already responded to advocacy efforts by introducing new services, mostly do so by financing through local tax income. As these resources are scarce, they are usually insufficient to meet the local needs NGOs have identified.

Theme: Community activism
Gambia   , , ,
Project: Strengthening Advocacy Capacity of Civil Society in The Gambia
Evaluation Date: December 2013
Report: [report link]
Lesson Learned:

To raise awareness during NGO week in Gambia, NGOS organized exhibition stalls, panel discussions, and live radio broadcasts to explain how they contribute to improvements of basic service delivery. This led to many people who visited asking for more information about how to claim their rights and entitlements. One case involved a local woman, whose stall and contents were seized by the police, when she tried trading vegetables on an informal street market. Proving that she is a regular taxpayer and stating the fact that the town has no official marketplace for women to sell their items, she successfully reclaimed her produce and today still sells in the same place.

 

 

Theme: Community activism
Gambia   , , ,
Project: Grassroots Gender Accountability in Uganda
Evaluation Date: April 2014
Report: [report link]
Lesson Learned:

Although written in English, Village Budget Club members found the budget monitoring and service tracking manual easy to use, because (i) English-speaking training facilitators were recruited from within the local community to address possible language and literacy issues; and (ii) at trainee stage, monitors teamed up in pairs comprising of one English speaker, thus enabling easy reference to the manual as and when needed

Theme: Interaction with government
Uganda   , ,
Project: Grassroots Gender Accountability in Uganda
Evaluation Date: April 2014
Report: [report link]
Lesson Learned:

Investigative journalism was intended to critically review shortcomings discovered by VBCs throughout the project’s target districts; TV and radio shows were meant to overcome the lack of interfaces between the local population and duty bearers and to serve as a strategy for increased accountability. Furthermore, NGOs are still inviting the grantee’s Kibaale field officer to radio shows to share the approach and achievements of the monitoring work with a wider audience. One particular radio station has even offered free airtime. There is hence relevant impact towards transparent, gender-responsive local service provision in the form of vivid online readership discussion and comments in relation to the project’s investigative journalism outputs.

Theme: Interaction with government
Uganda   , ,
Project: Grassroots Gender Accountability in Uganda
Evaluation Date: April 2014
Report: [report link]
Lesson Learned:

Visibly empowered district and sub-county councillors expressed with pride their new influence on the gender-sensitive application of laws, policies and local budgets. Former women MP trainees proudly cooperated across party lines on priority issues of Ugandan women in parliamentary committees. The project’s most remarkable achievement wasthe newly introduced legal requirement that future drafts of the country’s annual budget need to be certified as gender sensitive prior to parliamentary approval.

Theme: Interaction with government
Uganda   , ,