PRESENTATION ON GENDER ACCOUNTABILITY BY CSOs IN OYAM DISTRICT AT PROTEA HOTEL, KAMPALA

1. PRESENTATION ON GENDER ACCOUNTABILITY BY CSOs IN OYAM DISTRICT AT PROTEA HOTEL, KAMPALA DATE: 1ST AUGUST 2014

2. Content of the presentation • Introduction; • Achievements; • Lessons learnt; • Challenges; • Recommendation; • Conclusion.

3. Introduction Action for Development (ACFODE) is an indigenous voluntary, non-governmental women’s organization that advocates for gender equality and equity of all opportunities in all spheres through advocacy, networking and capacity building for both women and men. With funding from DIAKONIA, ACFODE has been implementing a three year project titled “Promoting Gender Accountability and Good Governance at Local Level” since 2012. The project has been implemented in Lango sub region (Kole , Oyam and Apac) districts.

4. In Oyam district, there are 12 sub counties. The project has been implemented in the sub counties which were grouped into four (4) clusters that is; Central cluster comprising of Ngai, Abok and Oyam Town Council, Eastern cluster comprising of Aleka, Otwal and Iceme sub counties, Southern cluster comprising of Loro, Acaba and Aber sub counties, Western cluster comprising of Myene, Minakulu and Kamdini sub counties. The project contributed to the enhancement of democratic governance and gender accountability at local in Uganda by;

5. Increasing knowledge and awareness of elected leaders at local government level of their roles and responsibilities as well as on gender accountability issues; • Educate citizens on the tenets of good governance and gender accountability; • Enhance capacity of civil society actors to promote good governance and gender accountability at local government level and to conduct civic education; • Build the capacity of civil society actors to support voices of the poor to advocate for women’s rights and demand better service delivery; • Create a platform for interaction between citizens and elected leaders.

6. Achievements • Through the empowerment and facilitation from ACFODE with support from DIAKONIA, we managed to have the following achievements; • Reduced rate of domestic violence. A case in Ngai police outpost • Reduced rate of forced and early marriages • Community are empowered and able to hold their elected leaders accountable. A case in Kulakula parish, a community member reported parish chief for collecting money from the beneficiaries of restocking programme.

7. Many schools have introduced school feeding programmeseg. Kulakula P/S, Ngai sub county, Anotocao P/S, Loro sub county. • Good number of women benefitted from the different development programmes like National Agricultural Advisory Services (NAADS), Second Northern Uganda Social Action Fund (NUSAF2), Community Demand (CDD). • Communities were able to make community contribution to support different development programmeseg collecting money to repair boreholes, opening up community access roads, constructing grass thatch houses for teachers.

8. The local leaders have started to give the accountabilities to the electorates. • Budgets at all sub counties were raised to support women activities like celebration of women’s days. • Improvement in health service delivery, example health workers were recruited and posted to the different health facilities. Also there is increased male involvement in antenatal care.

9. Lessons learnt Through out the interventions, we have been able to learn the following from the community; • Women were denied their rights .i.e they are depressed by men not to express themselves in community meetings, to participate in the local government planning processes; • Women were not considered in the different government programmes before ACFODE intervention. • Both local government, political leaders and grass root community members were very interested in the project that it came at the right time.

10. The conversation targeted all stakeholders making everybody held responsible i.e local leaders, religious leaders, political leaders and the grass root community; • The community can exercise their rights strongly and wisely when empowered; • The community members are ignorant about their rights and responsibilities; • The communities were not demand for accountabilities from their leaders.

11. Challenges • Despite the fact that the achievements were met, there have been also some challenges which have been encountered. Among them were:- • High turn up of participants making snacks and refreshments to be inadequate. • Lack of identification materials like T-Shirts, caps, tags; • Difficulty in monitoring and following up of the issues raised by the community members due to lack of transport facilitation;

12. Not all the sub counties within the clusters were reached due to few numbers of the citizen’s conversation scheduled; • Inadequate materials to support documentation like cameras.

13. Recommendation • We as civil society of Oyam clusters humbly request that the below suggestions be considered in order to overcome the above challenges. • DIAKONIA should continue with supporting ACFODE so as to continue with the project; • Procurement and distribution of bicycles to Civil Society Actors so as to facilitate monitoring and follow up of issues under concern;

14. Citizen’s conversation to be scheduled monthly so that the impact of the project is more felt; • Need to increase on the number of expected participants for the citizen’s conversation; • Procurement of materials like cameras to support documentation of activities.

15. Conclusion The implementation of the project entitled “Promoting Gender Accountability and Good Governance at local government level” was generally a success. The community members commended ACFODE for the tremendous efforts to transform Oyam communities and empower women in all spheres of life.

16. They highly requested DIAKONIA to continue with supporting implementation of the project through ACFODE so as to empower them with knowledge that will transform their lives which they believed will make them informed of their roles and rights/ avail them with the relevant laws and policies to enable them perform their mandate in a professional manner.

17. The last citizen’s conversation held in Okomo parish, Ngai sub county

18. A community borehole repaired by community of Kulakula P/S, Ngai sub county

19. Below is a borehole fenced by the community using the available local materials

20. Thank you!