A Poverty Action Fund monitoring case from Bukonjo county:

Author(s): Willem Overbeke
Publication date: Wednesday 08 December 2004

An organisation working in the frontline towards inclusive governance is KALI, in Bwera, Bukonjo county, Kasese. Since 1997 KALI is involved in anti-corruption activities, initially geared towards awareness raising and capacity building at grassroots level to analyse and fight corruption causes.

However, since 2001 the policy space (created by the decentralisation process and the PEAP) for increased community participation in planning, budgeting and monitoring of poverty eradication, is being explored by KALI to develop a program aimed at grassroots monitoring of expenditures and pro-poor policies. During 2001-2003 KALI facilitated the formation of grassroots public expenditure committees in four parishes of Bwera and Karambi sub-counties. After sensitisation workshops for awareness creation on the rights and responsibilities in the planning and monitoring of public expenditure, budget monitoring committees were facilitated with knowledge and skills in public expenditure tracking, lobbying and advocacy skills. The committees developed their own monitoring indicators which formed the basis of the public expenditure monitoring exercise. The results have been documented and presented to the sub-county leadership, the district council and the RDC office for action. The program has inspired the community members to the extent that some of them are now beginning to organise monitoring exercises, publish their reports and use them as a tool for dialogue with their local government officials. All monitoring committees are now also actively involved in the Anti-corruption campaign in Rwenzori of the Anti-corruption Coalition Uganda.

Though the government has put in place mechanisms for fostering partnerships in the eradication of poverty, according to KALI these initiatives alone cannot foster good governance. In practice the process of involving poor people in influencing policies in Uganda is a new phenomenon and in many local governments both human and institutional capabilities require strengthening. In Uganda the poor lack control of decision making and are typically regarded as recipients of the outcomes from national policies. The utmost challenge KALI is facing is that citizen’s participation still lacks a formal and institutional framework. Also citizen are not aware of their rights to participate actively in the planning and monitoring of public expenditure and do not envisage their role in shaping national policy, save for the occasional elections. Thus KALI has realised that there is a lot to be done in the area of civic education, if the people are to achieve meaningful participation in planning and influencing of government policy. While overall citizen participation is still minimal, according to KALI, gender inequality and women non-involvement in development programs remain pervasive in spite of affirmative action.

KALI works to overcome the limitations as regards the effectiveness of monitoring, as communities are not homogenous and thus also preferences are not alike. Also some groups (men, literate or better informed, etc.) may capture the benefits of monitoring, as constraints on monitoring are being women, being illiterate and/or lack of access to information.

Since 2003 KALI has embarked on a new program to facilitate and empower grassroots communities to contribute to, and monitor implementation of PEAP in all five sub-counties of Bukonjo county west constituency. It will support communities to develop Community Based Public Expenditure Monitoring Systems (CBPEMS) and indicators for poverty monitoring analysis. Public Expenditure Monitoring Committees (PEMCs) are formed at parish level with representation drawn from different parts of the villages within the parish where the project is implemented. The PEMCs are voluntary structures formed by civil society interested in monitoring of PAF. All PEMCs in a sub-county (five) will form a sub-county PEMC forum. As these discussions forums are being institutionalised, PEMCs spearheaded by KALI will work with local governments to create a transparent public information system that allows the public to access data on budget allocation, criteria for target group identification, and disbursement mechanism.

In addition to the primary beneficiaries, the citizen of Bukonjo county west constituency, KALI is convinced that there will be many secondary beneficiary institutions, as the experience collected would generate a lot of data, action and recommendations for policy makers and CSOs, to incorporate views of the poor in the sub-county, district and national planning.

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