Capacity Building for Local Councils

Ever since the first decentralisation reforms were initiated in Cambodia, more and more functions have been delegated to communal, municipal or district authorities. This is a positive development, as decisions indeed need to be made as close to the citizens as possible.

Yet if the local administrations are to efficiently perform these new roles and become really responsive to the public’s demands, then much more has to be done to increase their institutional capacity. Officials have to learn how to accomplish their mandates in a professional and accountable way.

This Is Where We Start

60%

of the citizens in the target districts were not satisfied with local government

15%

of them participated in local public planning before the project started

50%

of local councillors thought they didn’t have the capacity to carry out their roles

Although the organic law broadly defining the sphere of competence of sub-national authorities was passed in 2008, the Government began to take more courageous steps toward real local autonomy only by mid of the next decade. The decentralisation process has been slow and difficult, especially because various functions have often been delegated in a formalistic way, without offering local officials the actual means to exercise them.

Up until today, the necessary financial and human resources are still missing in most rural or smaller urban areas, but there is an even more fundamental problem too: Councillors are lacking the capacity needed in order to address and eventually solve the issues raised by citizens in their constituencies.

Moreover, according to the latest estimates, the poverty rate in the target provinces (Pursat, Banteay Meanchey, Kampong Speu, Kampong Thom, Kandal and Kep) is almost 20 percent, which is much higher than the national average and further limits the instruments at one’s disposal, emphasizing the need for effective action.

Our Fact-Based Approach

The National Committee for Sub-National Democratic Development (NCDD) is now in the final stages of implementing its first 10 year programme aimed at decentralisation. Recently, the focus has shifted here toward service delivery at the local level, and, most importantly, fiscal decentralisation. There is a strong participation and social accountability component involved, too, under which the Government has joined systematic partnerships with civil society organisations.

API has been active in this field through various I-SAF related initiatives, as described here, here, and here. On the other hand, as far as capacity building for local councillors is concerned, our main goal is to contribute to a real change based on the real needs these officials perceive, as well as on the demands that becomes apparent once a constant dialogue between them and their constituents is initiated. We have therefore taken pains to assess both the institutional capacity of the sub-national authorities and the personal skills of individual councillors in a serious and thoroughgoing way, in order to come up with an offer we have tailored on the basis of these findings.

The Project’s Idea

Against this background, at the beginning of 2019, API has launched an initiative called “Enhancing the Institutional and Operational Capacities of the Provincial Associations of Local Councillors”, in order to primarily fulfill the general demand for more professionalism and more efficiency at the level of the district and commune authorities.

Officials working there had already joined provincial associations in the early days of the decentralisation process, so our project has been able to use this existing infrastructure as a convenient mechanism to organise numerous meetings, coordinate action and disseminate know-how in a systematic way. Within a timeframe extending until the end of 2021, we are offering various trainings ranging from financial management and proposal writing up to resource mobilization and public accountability.

The first results are encouraging: After attending our workshops or using the online learning platforms we created together with our partners, a significant number of local councillors are now more confident that they could plan and implement small initiatives, thus responding to the demand in their communities. While our choice of provinces has been based on our previous experience and contacts, we strongly believe that, in the future, our initiative can and should be extended to cover the whole country, since the need for capacity building is definitely there.

How We Work on It

With over three million final beneficiaries in six provinces, and a budget of almost 500,000 dollars, this is one of the most ambitious endeavours we have recently dedicated to local governance. The project is funded by the European Union and implemented by a consortium in which API is joined by Aide et Action and AMDCSPUR, the association of local councillors in the Pursat province. While the latter assumes a leading role, bringing in valuable first-hand experience with the actual needs of sub-national administrations, the former contributes expertise in the field of modern lifelong education, professional training and e-learning.

The capacity building measures directly involve more than 2800 commune and district officials, as well as 1750 representatives of women, youth and persons with disabilities. This is because, here too, we want to make sure that the voices and demands of these vulnerable groups are really heard and taken into account.

Let’s Learn Together

Together with our partners, we have created a digital learning platform, where our training materials are being offered to a growing number of participants. It is our intention to open this opportunity to further local officials and representatives of civil society, if we are able to further pursue our project goals in other provinces.

Part of our toolkit is already available to a broad audience, addressing complex and abstract issues in an attractive, easily understandable and interactive way. All this complements, of course, the face-to-face group workshops API has been holding regularly in all participant provinces.

What We Have Learnt So Far

Although several years ago the central administration used to offer local official the opportunity to attend some capacity building courses, such measures are now rare and underfinanced. While the local civil society and international development partners can undertake some of these tasks, sub-national authorities should press the government for more involvement.

It is in the interest of local councillors to achieve concrete results within their new sphere of competence and to have further functions delegated to them in the future. Therefore, they need the skills to effectively advocate for more and more consistent decentralisation until the higher administration levels realize that this is a top priority.

The majority of the local officials are well over 40 years old and have at best completed secondary education, while males are by far overrepresented in these commune and district bodies. This makes it all the more necessary to redouble the efforts toward a broad participation by underrepresented groups, especially women and the youth.

The demographic structure of the councils also poses some challenges related to the adequate formats of the trainings. However, the use of digital technology is widespread, so e-learning seems to be a promising approach.

Join the Conversation

Whether or not you happen to work in the local administration, we would like to invite you to enter our dialogue on the topic of capacity building for commune, district, municipal and provincial officials.

At the end of the day, these government bodies are there to represent the citizens, effectively address their demands and be as close as possible to their constituents. In order to exchange views with our team or with people who might happen to be your own local representatives, you can access our Facebook page or the forum on our digital learning platform.

Description
Enhancing Institutional and Operational Capacities of the Provincial Associations of Local Councils (2019-2021)
This EU funded project focuses on strengthening the capacity of the Provincial Associations of Local Councillors (PALCs) and their members, by promoting accountability, transparency and responsiveness to the demands of citizens and the needs of vulnerable groups. With a total budget of almost 450,000 euro and six target provinces, it is one of API’s bigger projects, and we implement it in a joint venture with the Provincial Association of Local Councillors in Pursat and Aide Et Action International (AEA). You can find detailed information about this endeavour here, read our latest report, watch our project videos or follow the media coverage of this initiative.
Citizens’ Voices and Actions for Sustainable Development in Cambodia (2019-2025)
Benefiting from the generous support of DanChurchAid (DCA) and Bread for the World to the tune of almost 600,000 dollars, this ambitious endeavour has the overall objective of fulfilling the rights and enhancing the voices of citizens, in an effort to make the country's development more sustainable. On the one hand, we want to actively engage right holders, especially women, youth, people with disability, low income citizens and their community based organisations (CBOs), encouraging them to get involved in the processes of public planning and budgeting at the district level. The latter has been playing a much bigger role since 2020. Citizens and CBOs should hold authorities accountable for service delivery and budget implementation. On the other hand, we would like to see an improvement in the citizens’ access to public information, especially when it comes to public budgets. We are pursuing activities related to this project in nine provinces. You can read our latest report, watch our project videos, or dive into the details following this link.
Voices and Actions of People with Disabilities in Social Accountability (2019-2021)
For API, inclusion is essential, especially when it comes to the issue of participation in local decision making processes. The main goal of this project is therefore to amplify the voices of persons with disabilities. This will provide them both the opportunity to make themselves heard, and an enhanced access to more equitable, quality public services. The target district is Tramkak in the Takeo Province, and the funding, around 150,000 dollars, is provided by the Dutch Foreign Ministry’s Voice grant facility, managed by Oxfam in Cambodia. Our partner in this initiative is Epic Arts. You can read more about this flagship project here. You can also download our latest report, watch our project videos, dive into the materials we produced for our National Conference on Social Accountability at the beginning of 2020, or learn more about inclusion in I-SAF by watching our training series dedicated to this topic.
One Window for Citizens (2019-2022)
API is implementing this civic tech undertaking in a consortium with Nickol Global Solutions (NGS) and InSTEDD, our budget share being 460,000 dollars, financed by the USAID. The aim is to design and deploy technical innovations in order to stimulate citizen engagement, comprehension and awareness of, as well as demand for quality in the public services offered by the One Window Service Offices under the authority of the district and provincial administrations. We focus on the provinces of Battambang, Kampong Chhnang and Banteay Meanchey in an effort to increase accountability. You can find out more details about this here and read our latest report here. Pidor Facebook ChatBot OW4C Public Dashboard
Supporting Meaningful Civic Engagement for Improved Accountability by Leveraging Digital Technologies (2019-2023)
In a similar vein, API has joined a partnership with CARE Cambodia and InSTEDD in order to enhance citizens’ participation through innovative tech solutions. The EU granted API 425,000 euro for this endeavour, which is part of Implementing the Social Accountability Framework (I-SAF), a broad reform agenda assumed by the Government, and supported by development partners and civil society. While our overall objective is to develop effective, accountable and transparent institutions and ensure public access to information, we are specifically concentrating on empowering young women belonging to indigenous minority groups, as well as on building the capacity of the Community Accountability Facilitators (CAFs) in four provinces. The project produced lots of results in 2022 despite, the COVID-19 challenges. The consortium partners carried out information for citizens (I4C) awareness raising activities, reaching over 30,000 citizens to improve citizens ' understanding of their rights, standards and performance as well as budget information on communes, schools, and health centre services. The citizen monitoring activities achieved to organise 96% of the 1,086 planned community scorecards and service provider self-assessment meetings despite the disruption of the commune election in early June 2022. The joint accountability action plans (JAAP) implemented 78% of the 1,926 actions planned in 2022. As a result of the above activities, the target community gained enhanced knowledge on rights, the standards, and duties of elected commune councils. They gained confidence to give feedback and ask questions to local authorities about commune, school, and health centre activities. The key target groups – in particular youth, women and ethnic minorities –, demonstrated behavioural changes, such as an increased use of health centre services during pregnancy, motivating their children to attend school and registering birth certificates at the commune office. The scorecard provided insight into the improvement criteria of standards and performance of public services raised by citizens. The service providers took responsive action to improve soft-skills and small-scale infrastructure, including women’s toilets, ramps for people with disability, and office materials and equipment that enhance service delivery. The digitised community scorecard application (DCSC App) was improved for easier use and to address software bugs. Input for ideas was sought from 70% of participants (8,634 people, 62% women). The newly designed workplan to strengthen the capacity of Community Accountability Facilitators (CAFs) was developed and implemented. For the new 2023 fiscal year, 100% of JAAP were developed in 181 planned communes. Advocacy and Policy Institute (API), Innovative Support to Emergencies Diseases and Disasters (InSTEDD) and CARE International in Cambodia with the local partners: Partners for Development in Action Family Health Development Action for Health Development Community Development Centre Nak Akphivath Sahakum Kampuchea Women Welfare Action Promvihearthor Khmer Association for Development of Countryside Youth Council of Cambodia Save Vulnerable Cambodian Conserve Indigenous People Languages Building Community Voices Alliance for Conflict Transformation My Village Read our latest report here.
Citizens’ Voices and Actions in Social Accountability (2019-2021)
Also as part of Implementing the Social Accountability Framework (I-SAF) and as a first, API and Oxfam brought the idea of social accountability to Phnom Penh, more specifically to the administrative unit of Khan Sen Sok, insisting that local authorities and service providers such as primary schools and health centres need to be responsive to the citizens’ feedback and demands. We are also exploring how social accountability can be expanded to social protection services like the application process for equity cards that entitle low income and otherwise disadvantaged citizens to free of charge health services. The public should know what the service standards and the costs of these services are, and should be able to provide opinions and influence changes. In 2019 and 2020, Oxfam Cambodia has supported this piloting effort with 50,000 dollars per year. Watch the videos of some of our project activities here, learn more from our informative animations here, or read our latest report here.
Enhancing Local Democratic Governance in Cambodia (2018-2020)
This project set out to strengthen local governance and social accountability in four communes of the Kampong Thom and Banteay Meanchey provinces. It was funded by UNDEF with a total budget of 150,000 dollars. To achieve our goals, we focused on citizens’ participation in monitoring service delivery by local authorities, and we benchmarked this by two citizen scorecard surveys. The first served as the baseline, expressing citizens’ needs and demands, while the end survey evaluated the results achieved. The scorecard findings can be read here. API worked with three implementing partners, the Cambodian Organisation for Women Support (COWS) in Kampong Thom, the Village Support Group (VSG) in Banteay Meanchey, while the Coalition for Partnership in Sub-National Democratic Development (CPDD) disseminated the results in a national conference on social accountability in February 2020. You can read our last project report here.
Change the Game Academy for Local Resource Mobilisation Capacity in Cambodia (2019-2023)
Our objective here is to secure the resources civil society organisations can rely on in order to sustain their operations in Cambodia by building their organisational and leadership capacity of local resource mobilisation and mobilising support/advocacy. The funding for these measures, is coming from the Wilde Ganzen Foundation in the Netherlands, API being one of the national partners in the implementation. The other partner is the Cooperation Committee for Cambodia (CCC), and, together, we are striving to make sure this learning programme meets international standards, while addressing the concrete needs of the local participants. You can experience more about this project here, read our latest report, and watch some of our videos. You can also book our courses here.
Strengthening Youth Participation in Local Planning and Budgeting (2019-2021)
We insist on improving the quality of social services offered by local authorities, and one way to do this is to encourage young people to participate in the planning and budgeting processes. This initiative is funded by UNICEF, with almost 130,000 dollars. The target districts are in Phnom Penh, Kandal and Kratie. You can read our latest project report and watch a TV talk-show about it here.
Youths Debate the Development of the Cambodian Access to Information Law (2019-2023)
Here, the objective was to create a new dynamic in a push for the Government and the Parliament to discuss, improve and pass the Cambodian access to information law. Our method of choice was inviting youth from all provinces to Phnom Penh, and have them debate about this topic. Although the law was not passed in 2020, the draft has been greatly improved due to our advocacy efforts. The project benefited from the support of the Swiss Development Cooperation Agency (SDC), DanChurchAid (DCA) and Bread for the World. You can consult our last report, listen to the debates or watch our project video here.
Voices and Actions of Young Women Leaders and Entrepreneurs (2019-2023)
Under Pact Cambodia’s WE Act project, API has joined forces with the Independent Democracy of Informal Economy Association (IDEA), which is an association currently representing hundreds of informal street and market vendors in Phnom Penh, of whom 95% are women. Together, we are trying to strengthen their capacity to mobilise support and engage in advocacy, based on API’s facilitation expertise. Our key target group here are 20 local young women leaders who are learning to negotiate for their and their groups of market and street vendors’ concerns. Ten further participants from other women’s micro-entrepreneur networks and/or youth leaders have been invited to join API’s applied advocacy capacity development programme. This initiative is funded by USAID, the total budget being around 35,000 dollars. After 2020, in the context of the growing social problems caused by the Covid pandemic, the project is focusing increasingly on the issue of social protection. You can read our latest report here.
Innovations for Social Accountability in Cambodia (2020-2024)
Ta Khmao, the capital of the province of Kandal, has not had a lot of experience with implementing social accountability related initiatives yet. Therefore, this API project funded by the USAID through Family Health International (FHI360) is undertaking various activities aimed at helping citizens improve their capacity of requesting public information, networking for collective action, and developing solutions to the problems facing the local community. Using modern tech solutions, API will thus enable residents to score the performance of public service providers and actively participate in developing and implementing joint accountability action plans with representatives of local authorities. The total budget of the initiative is 380,000 US dollars. Read our latest report here or watch our informative animation.
Access for All (A4A): Promoting Access to Information in Cambodia (2020-2023)
In this endeavour which benefits from funding through a grant offered by the US Department of State, we are focusing on increasing the availability of public information in indigenous communities, especially among indigenous women. Recent studies have shown that, in Cambodia, women from vulnerable groups often do not have the necessary means to exercise and defend their rights in case of disputes or even in everyday life situations. Limited access to education, but also limited access to public information are definitely the main causes of a state of affairs where influential private entities are taking advantage of indigenous women groups, while state officials do not always treat them as equal to any other Cambodian citizen. Collective property rights and land concessions are undoubtedly one of the main issues here, yet the underlying problem is more general. Therefore, together with our partners from the East-West Management Institute (EWMI), we are focusing on building capacity in these communities, by offering tailor-made training courses covering topics such as grassroots advocacy, requesting information from public authorities or budget control skills. At the same time, we are working on a dedicated online learning platform, as well as on two tracking tools meant to help indigenous women monitor the legal compliance of land concessions and the public spending by district administrations. The project is being implemented in three provinces, with a total budget of almost 200,000 US dollars. You can read our annual project report here and watch our documentary video series by clicking on this link.
Promoting Rights, Voices, Choices and Decisions for Citizens (Pro-Citizens, 2016-2019)
Objective: Contributing to improve local governances and democratic participation of citizens. Result: The capacities of individuals (women, men & youth) and CBOs are improved to participate in decision making processes on commune development processes The capacities of local councils is strengthened to work with CBOs and NGOs in response to public needs Enhanced partnership between government and civil society in responding to public needs and concerns You can read summary here.
Implementation of the Social Accountability Framework (I-SAF, 2016-2018)
Overall Objective: To reduce poverty through democratic, inclusive and equitable local governance and more accessible and equitable public service delivery. Specific Objective:To enhance the performance, responsiveness and accountability of local government and service providers (specifically communes, health centres and primary schools) in 20 districts Ratanakiri, Mondulkiri, Koh Kong, and Kampot. Result: Enhanced access to Information and Budgets Strengthened citizen-led monitoring Strengthened capacities of local NGO partners, CBOs, Community Accountability Facilitators through Facilitation and Capacity Building Contributed to improve government policies, guidelines and practices through enhanced learning, feedback and monitoring-documented lesson learnt and best practice from ISAF implementation You can read summary here.
Promoting good governance by increasing access to information and strengthening the independent media (2015-2018)
Overall Objective: To contribute to a more equitable, open and democratic Cambodia by increasing access to information, a demand for good governance, and an independent media Specific Objectives: To strengthen the independence and professionalism of the media To improve the quality of media content To improve access to and use of public information Result: Media equipped with the skills to disseminate independent media content Increased dissemination of independent media content of key local issues Evidence gathered at community level of key local issues Policy analysis undertaken of key local issues Local authorities have improved capacity around access to information You can read summary here.
Working Towards an Access to Information Law in Cambodia: Bridging the Government and Citizens for Participatory Law-Making (2014-2018)
Overall Objective: To support the drafting of an effective Cambodian Access to Information law by engaging the sectoral base, assessing the policy gaps, and providing inputs for integration. Result: With the inputs from UN agencies (UNESCO and OHCHR) and civil society organisations (CSO) the A2I Technical Working Group completed the draft of A2I law and disseminated the document on 31 January, 2018; The whole contents of the draft of A2I law was reviewed by a legal team with consultations among the members of CSO A2IWG; Two analysis reports on the Secrecy of Information and a Complaint Mechanism developed and submitted to the Ministry of Information, the UNESCO and OHCHR; The nine (9) legal reviews and analysis were consolidated into one report, printed and distributed to all relevant Government Ministries, NGOs, Private Sectors and the general public; The reports contributed to development of drafting of A2I laws, and to guide all relevant actors, especially relevant Ministries in development and/or amendment of the policies and laws with maximum information disclosures to be in line with A2I law after the new law is approved; In collaboration with sectoral based NGO networks, the discussions, the inputs and recommendations compiled for supporting the development of the draft A2I law; A training curriculum on “Access to Information” was developed which included key contents of A2I law and guidelines, role of sub-national in disclosing information, democratic development, the implementation of social accountability framework (I-SAF), organic law, and information management; and A compilation of CSO inputs from all sectorial consultative forums was developed and it was also reviewed and finalized by the CSO A2IWG members. You can read summary here.
Enhancing the citizens’ access to public information through using mobile technology (APIM, 2015-2016)
Overall Objective: To contribute to poverty reduction and better protection and promotion of rights and voices, particularly for young people, women and vulnerable people and groups, by promoting a culture of public information disclosure, strengthening democratic participation, and transparency and accountability within the Decentralisation and De-concentration framework in Cambodia, particularly in the targeted Commune and District Councils, and advocating for equitable Result: Increased public information available on critical issues affecting communities in 13 district administrations; Increased access to public information on laws and policies; Supported productive dialogue and participation in democratic decision making to enhance the voices of and protect the rights of communities particularly vulnerable people in targeted areas; Increased their knowledge, understanding and skills of 195 councillors to support their functions with more transparency and accountability, including human rights, public information disclosure and collaboration with communities, local civil society and the government; Civil society organisations and networks are able to effectively contribute to democratic governance, human rights, environmental governance, de-centralisation, transparency and accountability, information disclosure and development processes at local and national level. You can read summary here.
Strengthening Democratic Governance (SDG, 2014-2018)
Overall Objective: To enhance the availability of public information to the public through mobile technology and improve two-way communications in order to ensure transparency, responsiveness and accountability of the local councils within local citizens in target areas. Results: To increase the availability of information and raise awareness about public services among target groups, particularly women, youth and disadvantage groups through introduction of interactive voice response (IVR) tool; To enhance the capacity of Local Authorities (LAs), Community Based Organizations (CBOs) and youth groups on how to use the IVR tool for providing public access to information and information disclosure; To set up IVR System to provide citizens access to public information in their target areas. Result: Training curriculum developed and training provided to 120 Local Authority, CBOs, and youths on access to information issues and roles of IVR in promoting access to information and provide feedbacks. Education materials (small booklet, poster and banners) on access to information and ICT application for promoting access to information developed and printed. Four community forums and outreach activities organized in the target areas. You can read summary here.
Increasing Access to Public Information (IAPI, 2013-2015)
Overall Objective: To contribute to poverty reduction and better protection and promotion of rights and voices, particularly for young people, women and vulnerable people and groups, by promoting a culture of public information disclosure, strengthening democratic participation, and transparency and accountability within the Decentralisation and De-concentration framework in Cambodia, particularly in the targeted Commune and District Councils, and advocating for equitable and sustainable public policy. Specific Objective: was to increase access to information for both the public and sub-national authorities as fundamental to effective participation and accountability in sub-national governance. Targeted areas: 49 communes and 10 districts of 5 provinces: Targeted groups: Youth (young), women/mothers, fishermen, farmers, elderly people, people with disabilities, and members of Community Based Organizations Result: Improved local councils’ capacity to provide public access to commune and district information; Increased understanding among target groups on their rights to access to public information; Enhanced capacities of civil society organisations working at sub-national government to advocate for greater transparency and information disclosure; Increased public dialogue on access to information by sub-national and national government officials, the Cambodian Parliament, UN agencies, civil society organisations and donors towards supporting, and developing the passage of an Access to Information (A2I) Law. You can read summary here.