(SAM) TRAINING

SAM Intervention in Manyara Region

Civic Social Protection Foundation (CSP) in partnership with Norwegian Church Aid (NCA) has been implementing a Social Accountability Monitoring (SAM) intervention in the Manyara region specifically in two district councils of Babati and Mbulu. The intervention is aimed at empowering citizens to participate actively in demanding justification and explanation from duty bearers on the allocation, use, and management of public resources as well as demanding duty bearers’ performance for the realization of people’s most pressing needs. After training Babati and Mbulu DC SAM team on the basics of Social Accountability Monitoring (SAM), the Babati team proceeded to the next stage of the SAM process which is document collection, analysis, and feedback. 

As a way of getting citizens’ understanding of how public resources were allocated and used for people to realize their basic human rights, duty bearers need to provide justification and explanation to citizens on such allocation and use. Hence, CSP organized two feedback meetings one for Council Management Team and the second one for community economic empowerment stakeholders. The CMT meeting was purposely for verification of data collected from the Council documents before presenting them to the entire stakeholders. 

 

Stakeholders feedback meeting 

On 13th Dec 2022, CSP conducted SAM stakeholders feedback meeting which brought in “community economic empowerment” stakeholders from Babati District Council. The purpose of the meeting was to present SAM findings to stakeholders as part of Advocacy for duty bearers to provide justifications and explanations on the identified gaps and any corrective measures taken to address the gaps. The meeting brought in CMT members, policymakers represented by the Council chairperson and vice chair, economic group leaders from different villages, economic groups facilitators, economic groups who have received funding from the council represented by Women, Youth, and Disabled group leaders, NGO representatives, District women economic Forum and SAM members. SAM team presented the findings to stakeholders and briefly the following were key findings. 

 Some key findings include;

  • Babati DC lacks a current strategic plan after 2016/17 – 2020/21 has ended.
  • The inability of the council to mobilize and facilitate the formation of disabled groups after which currently the disabled groups receiving funds are very few.
  • The introduction of an electronic system to facilitate the application and management of the 4:4:2 loan funds is good and efficient. Still, the council has no sufficient staff and facilities especially at the ward level to accommodate the system.
  • The rate and pace of repaying loans are very low, especially for Youth.
  • Most of the women, youth, and disabled have no sufficient information about the criteria for getting loans and other requirements from the Council.

Some accountability and actionable quotes from stakeholders and duty bearers.

Quote one: After this meeting, we all need to present all issues discussed in the meeting to the entire community so that all citizens can understand all the efforts being taken by the Government, especially in the provision of a loan to special groups” – DAS Babati on behalf of District Commissioner. 

 

Quote two: It’s true that Women, youth, and people with Disabilities group members have no enough information and knowledge on business entrepreneurship, financial literacy, and 4:4:2 loan requirements and criteria, hence am asking DED to task WEOs, s in all 25 wards of Babati DC to conduct community outreach to sensitize the community on the importance of forming groups and applying for 10% loans. 

 

Quote three: It’s important for the community development officers to do several visits to women’s groups in the community because they fear applying for council loans believing that their properties will be confiscated on failure to repay the loans. This is a lack of awareness -Mariam Mura groups community facilitator.

 

Quote four: It’s true that we are providing loans to women, youth, and disabled groups on yearly basis but the main challenge is that most of them don’t repay their loans on time as per agreement something which reduces the number of funds which would have been revolved and provided to other needy groups, and hence few groups can access the loans yearly – DCDO Babati DC.

 

Quote five: I am instructing the Head of the department for community development to write a letter to all CEOs to inform them about our decision and resolution reached in our meeting that they are supposed to give priority to people living with a disability whenever they go to their office to seek any service. This also applies to their support in accessing the 2% loan from the council – Ag DED Babati DC

 

Quote six: Normally there is a delay in accessing/disbursement of the 2% Disabled people loan that is normally applied from the Council. This hinders the effective implementation of our activities in a way that when someone wants to do may be business related to stocking cereals the season might have been passed over without procurement of any stock and hence results in losses – Betina a representative of People living with Disability group from Gendamara village.

Council Management Team (CMT) feedback meeting

On 12/12/2022 CSP conducted a feedback meeting with CMT members attended by the District Executive Director (DED) and head of departments. SAM findings were presented for the purpose of crosschecking the accuracy, validity, and reliability of data used to generate the report. It was also the platform where the SAM team and CMT members met for further familiarization. After the presentation, a few amendments were made to make the report more reliable and understandable. Finally, Babati DC Executive Director congratulated CSP and the SAM team for their tireless efforts to make citizens realize their rights and promised to provide more collaboration from her office.

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Presentation of SAM report to Babati DC CMT member

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Guest of honor and delegates following presentations carefully

After the presentation, stakeholders were given an opportunity to ask some questions and clarifications regarding the gaps which were found after which duty bearers were given an opportunity to provide justification and explanation for the identified gaps. After a long session of questions (justification and explanation) from stakeholders and responses from duty bearers, the guest of honor and Council chairperson provided the following way forward and action points which will be implemented by duty bearers to address the gaps.

 

  • DED to make sure that the new council strategic plan is prepared immediately by using its own source fund.
  • Council to make a special request to the Government to provide permission for additional employment of Community development officers.
  • DED office to write instructions to all WEOs and VEOs to provide support for community mobilization and sensitization in their areas, especially on conditions and requirements for accessing women, youth, and disabled loans. The information is to be presented to the next full council meeting for deliberation and verification.
  • Any group that will be denied the 4:4:2 loan due to corruption reasons should immediately report to their leaders, especially the Councilors.
  • DED to write instructions to all WEOs and VEOs on the importance of providing all citizens with equal rights and opportunities to demand justification and explanations on the use of public resources, especially in public meetings.
  • DED to write instructions to all WEOs and VEOs to inform them about the importance of giving priority to PWD when proving services in their offices. PWD should be given priority when seeking services from their offices and should be provided with any kind of support needed to make sure that they get their rights on time.
  • In case of any event where VEOs are denying and preventing any citizen to demand justification and explanations about the allocation and use of public resources, citizens can directly contact the Council chairperson to explain the scenario after which he gave the audience his mobile numbers.
  • A copy of all letters should be presented to the next full council meeting for verification.
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Guest of honor DAS on behalf of Babati DC officiating the meeting

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Council Chairperson insisting on the importance of 10% loans

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Mariam Mura one of the community groups facilitators