juliet – Page 14 – ICT4 Democracy

Civil Society Coalition to Stop Maternal Mortality in Uganda Reaction to FY 2013/14 Budget Speech

Posted on June 14, 2013 by juliet

In reaction to the release of the Uganda Budget FY 2013-14 on 13 June, 2013, a coalition of health advocacy organizations released the following statement: Reaction to the Financial Year 2013/14 Budget Speech.

In summary, from the Health Sector point of view projected budget for FY2013/14 is Shs 940.4BN compared to Shs 852.2BN approved budget FY 2012/13. This means its share of national budget is 7.4% from 7.8% in 2012/13. Hence an increase in absolute terms but decline in percentage share of the national budget.

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A summary of the partner’s activities May 2013.

Posted on June 11, 2013 by juliet

The network is comprised of 7 partner organisations in Kenya (2), Tanzania (1), and Uganda (4) and this is a summary of their activities in May 2013. More details available on the respective websites.

CHRAGG – Commission for Human Rights and Good Governance
The Commission has continued to create awareness of human rights and the SMS for human rights system, the campaign involved three regions (3) of which fourteen districts (14) were visited. The aim of this campaign was to educate ward leaders and districts officials. It also involved the training of three hundreds (300) students of Pendamoyo secondary school in Temeke, Dar es Salaam.

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Five Health Workers of Otwee Health Centre III in Amuru Town Council arrested over negligence of duty

Posted on June 11, 2013 by juliet

Laying on the veranda of Otwee Health Centre III in Amuru Town Council are the patients who visited the Health Centre on the 9th May 2013 to access medical services. However, it was unfortunate that there was no health worker at that time to attend to them. Having no alternative, the patients wait patiently for the health workers who end up reporting for duty at leisure. It clocks mid-day and no health centre staff has yet reported for duty.

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Expanding Outreach for Citizen participation and Improved Service Delivery in Uganda

Posted on June 10, 2013 by juliet

WOUGNET with financial support from the Swedish Program for ICT support to Developing Countries (Spider) conducted awareness raising meetings in the District of Tororo and Busia in Eastern Uganda from the 23rd -27th of September 2013. The awareness meetings was aimed at introducing the new project to the district and mapping stakeholders and partners to be involved in the Project.

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Health Service Delivery: Development Pact signing

Posted on May 16, 2013 by juliet

The principal objective behind development pact is to ensure transparency, accountability, public participation, standard of services and community inclusion in Health reforms and policy changes. Pact signing involved different stakeholder like district health officers, health workers, sub county chiefs, community volunteers (Voluntary accountability committee), Village health teams, health management committees, health workers, HIV/AIDS focal person and local leaders who pledged their commitments and team building towards improving health service delivery.

The development pact therefore mainly empowers existing structures and the entire communities to work together in improving service delivery; in this way they take ownership of project intervention and results.

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A summary of the partner’s activities in April 2013.

Posted on May 9, 2013 by juliet

The network is comprised of 7 partner organisations in Kenya (2), Tanzania (1), and Uganda (4) and this is a summary of their activities in April 2013. More details available on the respective websites.

CHRAGG – Commission for Human Rights and Good Governance

The Commission prepared and printed 2,000 flyers to promote awareness of the “SMS for Human Rights” system to the general public. The flyers, in Swahili, give instructions on how to use the SMS system and will be distributed to the general public during the awareness campaigns, public hearings and gatherings. An additional 2,000 copies will be printed when funds are available, hopeful it will be before the end of June 2013.

Unlike previously, the Government decided to pass its financial budget in April rather than July. The Management Information System unit participated in the preparation process in which CHRAGG’s Wilfred Warioba, as a budget officer, also participated in the activity held in Dodoma Region. The participation was crucial as this is where CHRAGG requested additional funds for the awareness campaign.

CIPESA– ICT Policy Centre for Eastern and Southern Africa

CIPESA commenced a mentoring programme for journalists in the northern region,particularly the districts of Gulu, Amuru and Kitgum, to use crowdsourcing and social media to report on health services delivery. The journalists are also being mentored in theuse of social media for social accountability. A particular focus is on the Peace,Recovery and Development Programme (PRDP), the government’s post-conflict blueprint for the northern region.

Participated in the Symposium on ICTs, Governance and Peace-building in Eastern Africa in Nairobi. The meeting brought together scholars from Addis Ababa University (Ethiopia), Strathmore University (Kenya), Simad University (Somalia), CIPESA (Uganda), University of Pennsylvania (USA) and Oxford University (UK) to examine the reasons behind the radically different approaches Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia have developed towards ICTs, Governance and Peace-building and draw comparative lessons that can be extended to other countries in the continent.

We continue to receive positive indications from our partners about the constituencies they are serving, who they say are increasingly using ICT, including social media, in interacting with other citizens and in discussing issues of concern to their communities. Particularly, the Kasese e-resource center is now posting their stories on YouTube. This is attributed to the Web 2.0 and social media training conducted through partnership with ToroDev and WOUGNET. Some of the videos are available here; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmKU01yyK-Q&feature=youtu.beK, http://youtu.be/TGKvJRzu37U, http://youtu.be/D5Q9liRhQLg

iHub – Nairobi Innovation Hub

iHub Research hosted a Water Ideation workshop held together with the iHub User Experience Lab. During this workshop the research team was able to present the findings from the ongoing research and discussed with the participants different approaches to providing citizens with mobile applications that provide water related information. However, because the turn-out from stakeholders in the water sector was very low, they were only able to gather of very little information at the workshop. The research team plans to host another ideation workshop where it is hoped that they will collect more insights from the stakeholders.

As part of the requirements for submitting a book chapter in the book “Technology Development and Platform Enhancements for Successful Global E-Government Design” edited by Dr Bwalya, K.J.(University of Botswana), iHub Research was requested to peer review and edit a chapter from one of the other authors. The research team was able to review and send comments to the organizer of the book and now await the feedback from the chapter on m-governance that iHub Research submitted.

The main challenge faced was that the Kenya general elections period affected the m-governance research activities. This is because, until the announcement of the Supreme Court decision on who the winner of the 2013 elections, many stakeholders were hesitant to confirm participation. The ideation workshop which took place immediately after the inauguration ceremony was thus poorly attended because most people we invited responded that they could not leave their work to attend the workshop.

KHRC – Kenya Human Rights Commission

Following, the successful and peaceful elections and the Supreme Court ruling on the 2013 Presidential election, it is upon Kenyans to play their role in ensuring good governance. Monitoring of various activities such as the Kisumu reaction after the Supreme Court ruling, swearing in of county reps and election of CDF committee members and other activities relating to the new devolution system. The hurinets were able to capture photos of these events which were provided to the KHRC. In Mombasa, Hurinets also used voice recorders during the visits from the President and the former Prime Minister before and after the Supreme Court ruling to record what was said in case of any incitement to violence in a highly politically tense environment. The use of social media as an advocacy tool remains to be a key activity of the hurinets. Through the use of their facebook page – https://www.facebook.com/vifanet.kenya?fref=ts Vision Facilitators continue to engage the public on issues around civic education especially with regard to the constitution and the roles of the elected state officers.

KHRC also posted a new publication on the Functions of Elected State Officers both on Twitter and Facebook as part of civic education. The publication outlines the functions and responsibilities of elected state officers who include the President, the Deputy President, the Governors, Women Representatives, Senators, Members of Parliament and County representatives. This is against a backdrop of a new demand by the newly elected Parliament for salary increase as soon as they got sworn in even before doing any work. The publication came about as a result of ICT4Democracy in East Africa Monthly Project Update studies by KHRC that revealed the public is largely ignorant on the new system of a devolved government. It outlines the amount the elected state officers will earn from the taxpayers and urges the citizen participation in ensuring they are kept accountable.

Additionally, this facebook page has proved effective on creating a dialogue on human-wildlife conflict which is a major issue in Laikipia. Uploading of photos on facebook and YouTube was also instrumental for the same.

The challenges faced included; difficulty in uploading videos on YouTube, especially where it proved to be very costly for a number of the Hurinets with slow internet connection s. The need for the use of a mixed-media approach especially where social media is mostly accessible to the youth and a such the older generation are left out.

TIU – Transparency International Uganda

Community health users from different parts of Lango region (northern Uganda) have called the toll free line (currently 5-10 calls a day) to report health care challenges at their health centers. Calls have continued to be received beyond project geographical area. The project staffs are updating the respective district officers regarding challenges being reported from various health centers for actions/solutions to be provided, however our first approach always is solving the problems at the health center level.
The social media page has become a key part documentation and sharing of information with global internet users. TIU has received more request for additional information from the page visitors. Most project images and their captions are always uploaded on www.facebook.com/StopAbsenteeism.

TIU jointly implementing an ICT project “Action for Transparency” that aims to fight corruption and mismanagement of government funds by putting the power to monitor the funds in the hands of citizens. Using a mobile phone with Internet access, anyone will be able to check the amount of government money pledged to each public primary school and public health clinic – and the amount actually spent. The project is being implemented in Kampala, Mukono and Wakiso areas in Uganda and in Lusaka, Zambia. The partners are, Transparency International in Uganda and Zambia, UMDF (Uganda Media Development Foundation), ZAMCOM (The Zambia Institute for Mass Communication) and Fojo Media Institute, Sweden.

ToroDev – Toro Development Network

ToroDev held an accountability workshop with Bufunjo People’s Forum in Bufunjo Sub County to facilitate engagement between the local leaders and the local citizens for discussions on service delivery and accountability. The workshop was mobilized using FM radio, MobileSMS, facebook and bulk e-mailing. The use of social media tools was primarily to attract the young people to the meeting.

They also facilitated a meeting between representatives of the local community of Mugusu Sub County, Kabarole District and the District Chairperson, to address the community’s priority service delivery needs. These included; a water gravity flow scheme for access to clean water, road and bridge repairs in the sub-county and the lack of toilets and safe water at Magunga Primary School.
ToroDev continued to hold the live weekly radio talkshows on public accountability for improved service delivery. The talk shows are held on HITS FM every Saturday evening.

They also held a monitoring and evaluation exercise assessing the performance of the advocacy forums in using appropriate ICT tools to monitor service delivery and demanding accountability from local leaders in the Rwenzori Region district of Kabarole. Five advocacy forums in Kabarole district were monitored. Local citizens’ Advocacy forums have increased from Seven (7) since November 2012 to eleven (11) in April 2013. The forums are initiated and led by rural monitors trained by ToroDev in partnership with WOUGNET in online advocacy for democratic engagement for improved service delivery.

The primary challenges faced are that physical participation of people from remote areas on radio programs is still a challenge, however ToroDev has encouraged them to use appropriate ICT tools like SMS and call-ins to participate on the live talkshows which they have embraced. Secondly, some leaders are still inaccessible to the local community; many of the local leaders are not willing to give accountability to the local people and tend to threaten local citizens who demand accountability.

WOUGNET – Women of Uganda Network

WOUGNET continues to work with the Voluntary Social Accountability Committees (VSACs), to report incidents of both poor and good service delivery on the Ushahidi platform. Examples include; in Angu Parish, Oyam District, the VSAC noticed that at a construction site where a sub county structure was being built, concrete wasn’t mixed well, the VSACs then advise the builders and constructor to demolish the building and start afresh, the builders refused later the VSAC reported to the sub county authorities, who ordered for the work to be re-done.

Another incident was at Angic primary school in Bala sub county where the Headmaster of the school was sending his teachers (Government school) to teach in a private school living children from his school untaught when the VSAC heard about it, they visited the headmasters office and warned him of the practice, they then stopped immediately and he apologised to the VSAC saying it won’t happen again.

Among other information uploaded include:-

Aporwegi Primary School to benefit from teachers’ houses under NUSAF II.
Challenges facing Aporwegi Primary School in Toro parish, Amuru Sub-County.
Increased water shortage in Pagak Parish, Amuru Sub-county is as a result of community negligence.
Amoikoma VSAC mobilized water users to raised funds to restore the broken bore-hole.

More Details of these stories are available on http://www.wougnet.org/ushahidi/reports.

The key challenges faced include; the high illiteracy level that is hindering beneficiaries to effectively use ICTs. Transport challenge as the VSAC say that at times there are issues that they need to follow up on but due to long distance they do not go. Power blackout especially with the return of the rainy season. Poor mobile phone network in some communities that frustrates the training when visits are made. And some local officials disregard and refuse to offer information to the VSACs when they are visited.

A summary of the partner’s activities between June 2012 and March 2013

Posted on May 3, 2013 by juliet

The network is composed of 7 partner organisations in Kenya (2), Tanzania (1) and Uganda (4) and this is a brief of their activities over the 10 month period.
CHRAGG – Commission for Human Rights and Good Governance
CHRAGG deployed an SMS system for human rights and good governance monitoring. The main challenge faced in setting up the system for affordable public use, was with regard to obtaining a toll-free SMS code number from the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority.
Nonetheless, while that negotiation was going on, they went ahead to train the staff of CHRAGG on using ICT in improving service delivery, by easing the means of submitting citizen complaints.

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Progress Report: ICT 4 Health Service Delivery

Posted on May 1, 2013 by juliet

Project Progress Report: July-December 2012

Title: Empowering Communities through ICT for better Health Service delivery.

Project Abstract

Years after the end of rebel insurgency, Northern Uganda continues to face challenges in terms of health service delivery. This is manifested mainly in high rates of absenteeism of health workers rendering dysfunctional the few available health centers. Medical workers’ absenteeism which is caused by many factors remains key cause of poor health service delivery in the region.

According to World Bank, health workers in Uganda operate under de-motivating terms and conditions of service characterized by low pay resulting in either migration to other countries for better pay or absconding from duty to attend to their private clinics/businesses.

Other organizations like WHO have attributed absenteeism to inadequate number of qualified health staff. The high level of absenteeism of health workers has ramifications for the quality of service provision (MOH 2008b). In addition, practices such as receipt of bribes, extortion of money from patients for services that should ideally be free, the outside sale of drugs and other public facility supplies and misappropriation of user charge revenue (applicable to referral units) are also common (McPake et.al. 1999).

The project is therefore aimed at promoting transparency and accountability in health service delivery through ICT to reduce the rates on absenteeism of health workers, increase community participation in demanding for Transparency, Accountability, functionality of health centers and empower communities in reporting cases of absenteeism through ICT and promote Local government Advocacy in health service delivery.

Current status

The toll free call center is currently being used as a key platform for community involvement and participation in ensuring social accountability and transparency of health workers. TI Uganda in the past six months has widely used atoll free call center was installed in May 2012 as a key platform for community involvement and participation in ensuring social accountability and transparency of health workers. The call center in November received a new twist where the community health users have called to seek for medical consultation, this shows how much the technology can do for the community beyond reporting challenges.

The call center network has greatly improved because the telecom inaction service provider due to our request has conducted network maintenance which has reduced the rates of call drops. The community has greatly adapted to technological approach of improving health service delivery which has been realized through their participation radio talk shows and calling the toll free line, some have even gone to the extent of requesting that the project intervention should be replicated in their districts and community.

Radio Talk Shows.

The radio talk-shows which have been implemented in the last six months has fostered community empowerment and engagement in demanding social accountability from their respective leaders, the community members every Wednesdays would listen to and call-in the station live to contribute or comment on the subject matter; there has also been a lot of knowledge sharing through the technology.

Development Pact Signing

This activity was conducted in December from 17th to 20th 2012 in the sub counties of Amach, Ogur, Iceme , Acaba and Loro in the health centers of Amach, Ogur, Iceme, Anyeke, Agulurude and Loro respectively. The stakeholders district health officers, health workers, community volunteers, health center health management committees, HIV/AIDS focal person, sub county chiefs, voluntary accountability committee members, village health teams (VHTs), Radio Q FM, Radio unity FM, Radio Wa FM, youth drama group and community people from the respective sub counties. The health workers together with community leaders, volunteers and district health officers have pledged their roles play in improving health service delivery at the respective health centers

Advocacy Interface meetings

Meetings with the respective district health officers aimed at improving health service delivery and recommending the use of existing policy guidelines towards overcoming health challenges has paid off; for the first time in history Anyeke Health center IV became the first health center IV to recruit and employ a medical doctor, something greatly attributed to SPIDER health project. In Lira district, the district health office/local government has improved staff accommodation in Ogur and Aromo health centers as result of the meeting, this is important because as long as causes of absenteeism are not addressed it would be very difficult to stop absenteeism.

Collaboration and Networking

TI Uganda in the last six months has greatly collaborated with partner civil society organizations in community empowerment. As part of collaboration, Justice and Peace Commission Lira (JPC) participated in development Pact Signing by providing free power generator and public address system that was used in conducting development pact signing, JPC also provided youth drama group who also freely acted drama during the development pact signing. During collaboration with JPC, TI Uganda only provided lunch allowance, generator fuel and microphone battery which made the whole activity cost effective.

TI Uganda also collaborated with Lira NGO Forum and JPC in conducting Radio Talk-Shows where Lira NGO Forum took lead in mobilizing participants, presenting during radio talk shows and registering participants. Their participation in Radio Talk-shows helped in empowering communities by encouraging their respective community knowledge workers and volunteers to participate in health center monitoring and calling the toll free call center number 0800200188 to report challenges and positive results at the respective health centers.

Radio Wa (Local FM Station) has continued to collaborate with TI Uganda by offering 3 free Talk-show airtime for TI Uganda to empower their Radio listeners towards improving of health service delivery in Northern Uganda and from time to time TI Uganda has also been invited to participate in planning session for community empowerment using ICT.

Collaboration with District Health Officers, The district health offices offered government vehicle for activity implementation with continued embracement of project intervention as a great contribution towards improving of health service delivery in their respective districts.

Documentation and Communication

The project has continued to create public awareness and informing sharing through facebook (social media) which has help to draw attention from different internet users from across the world. Social media has helped the project to reach thousands of people where some requested for additional information to enrich their research/studies,

ICT 4 Democracy in East Africa website has also been used in the last six months for information sharing. Blog posts hosted by Transparency International Secretariat in Berlin have been used to post issues of community empowerment and engagement, this blog has also helped to make the project to be widely known.

TI Uganda involvement of media house in project activities and sharing of information has enabled the project results and activities appear in Local news which has also built both project and organization visibility in Northern Uganda.

http://jkornet.com/2013/01/22/can-technology-help-african-women-to-fight-corruption/

Sustainability

The signed Development pact in the target health centers and radio talk shows held have greatly helped in up scaling community participation and ownership of the intervention where the community are now more informed and engaged in health center monitoring. Efforts are being made to ensure that through development pact, communities are able to continuously ensure that social accountability of health workers is at par.

Risks and risk management

Transport still remains a challenge under the project, the field office only has one motorcycle which is normally used for health field visits, some of the roads become impassable when its rainy season.

Project Coverage, the project coverers a very small geographical area and health centers yet on the other hand community continues to request for the intervention to be introduced and implemented in their sub counties and districts; this continues to remain a big challenge because however much we are willing to stretch out to a wider community, we are limited by funding. Part of risk management taken to mitigate the Risk and challenges has been development and submitting of project concept notes and project proposal of which none of them has yet been successful.

Project Budget Revision

The previously revised budget does require additional adjustment to cater for reallocation balances realized from activities and also to complete the implementation of development pact signing.

9. Response to audit

Project agreement; Auditors had recommended that we comply with all the provisions of the project agreement and as management we are closely monitoring the project implementation as per the provisions in the agreement.
Inadequate Coordination; the audit team recommended that TI Uganda administration staff should provide technical support to the field project team ; the Head office finance team has closely worked with the field office in all financial matters as per the financial policy manual and guidelines in place.
Comingling of funds; it was recommended that the project maintains a separate account for the funds received from SPIDER as per the funding agreement; this issues was resolved and even before the funds were transferred we had discussed this matter with the donor and we were given ago ahead to use an existing account. No other funds have been banked to that account except for SPIDER project.
Informal Procurement Team; the auditors had recommended that management appoints a formal procurement committee that should be trained in procurement and critical bidding process. Management has put in place a formal procurement committee.
Bank Reconciliations; the audit team recommended that the bank reconciliations be properly prepared and reviewed by the senior person on monthly basis; Management took this up and on monthly basis all bank reconciliations are reviewed by the executive director and verified by the accountant.
5% institutional Development; the auditors recommended that a clear policy be put in place in regard to 5% institutional development; this matter has been resolved and the finance policy has been reviewed.
Fixed Assets; Auditors recommended that all assets be engraved and included in the asset register; this has always been the practice, the asset register has been updated to cater for all essential information and all new assets have been engraved.
Insurance Cover; it was recommended that adequate insurance cover be availed against all insurable risks and insurance documents kept safely; Management is still working on alternative sources to cover funding for such costs which have not been taken care in the project budget.

10. Short Story (Attached separately)

Appendix 1 Project Story (http://www.ict4democracy.org/project-story-empowered-and-involved/ )

Appendix 2 Project Photographs (www.facebook.com/StopAbsenteeism )

11. Results Matrix – Activities, Results & Indicators

Departing from your original proposal describe the results of your activities by filling in the table below. Give special attention to any unexpected developments whether positive or negative and how they have been managed.

Input(resources used in activity)	Activities(what has been done)	Outputs(what has been produced)	Short term outcomes(anticipated & unanticipated)	Medium term outcomes(anticipated & unanticipated)	Indicators
	Toll free Call center operation	1749 in coming calls received.1857Out going calls	· The capacity and knowledge of callers have improved. · Feedback calls (out going calls) has created more statisfaction for the community callers.	· The community is more fucused in monitoring of health centers. · Healths are alert at all times since there misconducts can be reported by just a call away.	· Total number of both in-coming and out going calls
	Challenges/constraintsICT infrastructure accessibility among women is minimal.
Staff Perdiems Motorcycle fuel	Health Center Verification visits	· 66 Health center verification visits conducted in 8 target health centers of Lira and Oyam. · 6 Subcounty chiefs of Amach, Barr, Aromo, Ogur, Iceme and Loro sub county sensitized and involved in health service delivery monitoring. · 1 health worker from (Lira) Amarch Health center IV was found not be for study leave but recieving free salary for 4 years and disciplinary actions were taken by the district health office. · 890 (351 men and 539 women) sentized and empowered. · Women are more empowered and involved in health center monitoring. · More knowlege gained in using ICT for monitoring healthcare services. · Hygiene of Amach, Anyeke and Aromo Health center has improved. · District health officers embrace the results of the project intervention.			· The total number of health center verification visits conducted. · Number sub county chiefs/stakeholders sensitized.
	Challenges/constraints:ICT infrastructure accessibility among women is minimal.
Radio Talk Show block Airtime purchase. Spot Jiggles payments. Presenters’ presentating allowance. Accommodation, transport and food allowance	Radio Talk Shows	25Radio talk Shows Condcuted. An Average of 200 in-coming phone calls recieved during radio talk shows. 720 Radio Jinggles played for advertising both Radio Talkshow and toll free line. The community acquired knowlege and skills of using ICT for community development. Radio/Technoloy bringing communities together towards health service deleivery monitoring.			The number of people calling in during radio talk show.
	Challenges/constraints:District civil servants being too reserved to participate in radion programms.
Staff perdiems Safari Day lunch allowance for parntners and media. Mobilization (Airtime) Vehicle fuel. Vehicle hire.	Development Pact Signing	8 Development pact field activity conducted. 6 Development Pact document signed. 6 Anti corruption drama presented/played in 6 health centers. 1 drama presented by community women in Oyam. Community agained knowledge on various forms of corruption in health service delivery. Communities and their leaders acquired new ways of jointly working towards a common goal. The community are more united working togther to improve health service delivery. Communities and their leaders embraced the use of technology.			The number of community members leaders who have embraced development pact signing.
	Challenges/constraints:
Internet	Social Media and Documentation	108 Daily The number of people sharing stories about the project facebook Page 752 Weekly The number of people sharing stories about the project facebook Page 2659 of Monthly number of people sharing stories about the project facebook Page 1434 Daily The number of people who engaged with the project facebook Page 11112 Lifetime The total number of people who have liked the project facebook Page. (Unique Users) Knowledge shared and agained from global internet users.			The number of people/facebook users who have comented, viewed or liked post from the project facebook page.
	Challenges/constraints:
Staff Perdiems Motorcycle fuel (Activity combined with health center verification visits)	Advocacy Interface meetings	15 Advocacy meetimgs held. Districts Local government investegated and followed up recommented health care challenges that required governement role play. Challenges at health centers shared with higher authorities. Indiscipline health workers have faced displinary mearsures leading to their improved code of conduct. District health officers have gained more insight of health challenges at the health centers		District Health officers have contined to requeste the project intervention be replicated in the remaining sub counties/health centers of their respective districts	Testimonies from distict health officers.Actions taken by district health office towards improving health service delivery.
	Challenges/constraints: