On Friday, December 14, 2018, at the Royal Beach Hotel was helda capitalization workshop organized by Laboratoire-Citoyennetés with funding from Solidar Suisse as part of the program to support local democracy and citizen participation in 8 communes of the Central Plateau.
The workshop was attended by presidents of CSO networks, radio station managers, general secretaries of the program’s partner communes, and heads of associations working in the field….
The aim of the workshop was to share with partners the best practices and lessons learned identified midway through the program’s implementation.
From the changing perceptions of CSOs by local elected officials we can note :
Good practices:
– The program has begun to reverse negative perceptions of CSO citizen action among local elected officials, thanks to the CSO networking approach and their operationalization in the communes where the program is implemented
– The involvement of CSO networks by municipal executives in communal planning (preparation of the PCD, PCD monitoring and evaluation unit) and decision-making bodies;
– Mutual discovery of CSOs, the start of peer learning (pooling of skills and resources) and collaboration on new accountability, interpellation and advocacy issues.
Lessons learned
– The networking of CSOs for citizen action and the proven apolitical nature of the network restore trust between them and local elected officials and contribute to the credibility and consideration of their objective interpellations
– The strengthening of the legitimacy and credibility of CSO networks as actors for citizen initiatives;
– The effectiveness of CSO networks’ advocacy and interpellation actions in favor of public decision-making.
Best practices and lessons learned from the networks’ advocacy actions
Good practices
– Consultation between members of the CSO network’s office on issues or problems affecting public life in the local authority; inventory of public problems and prioritization of problems according to social relevance and significance,
– Prior concerted, relevant, formalized and explicit written interpellations by CSOs, resulting in a readiness on the part of mayors and/or municipal councils to listen attentively and take up CSO interpellations, whatever the form, and sometimes provide appropriate responses.
Lessons learned
Advocacy and lobbying actions by CSO networks have the best chance of influencing public decision-making if they are thematic, well-documented and targeted at relevant actors.
Revitalizing frameworks for citizen consultation and participation
Good practices
– The issuing or re-issuing of communal by-laws organizing the Cadre de Concertation Communal (CCCo) in almost all the communes involved in the program, to broaden the participating actors and include representatives of CSO networks;
– The use of the CCCo as a forum to encourage the participation of Village Development Committee (CVD) presidents in the dialogue
Lessons learned
Institutional concertation frameworks at communal level hold great potential for productive and inventive social and political dialogue, insofar as they are sufficiently accepted and used by local elected representatives as a mechanism or instrument of social cohesion.
Local radio as a forum for questioning and accountability
Best practices
The managers and presenters of the program’s radio partners have developed their own programs on accountability and interpellation, based on the contractual programs ave
c the LC, in view of the enthusiasm generated among listeners;
Local elected representatives and CSO network leaders have become highly sought-after players for radio hosts, with debates, interviews on accountability and calls for improved public service.
Lessons learned
People are increasingly interested in information about life in their communities; they are no longer simply consumers of information, but also suggest topics they would like to see debated on the radio;
The program has enabled mayors to reconsider radio as a privileged channel for communicating with citizens, using the language they understand best.
