UNDP’s democratic governance practice focuses on fostering inclusive participation, strengthening responsive governing institutions, and promoting democratic principles.
The project was formulated under the economic governance sub-area of the 2008-2013 10th EDF for the PALOP & TL, which allocates EUR 33.1 million to supporting governance initiative projects in PALOP & TL countries. This project is formulated on the basis a EU-UNDP partnership allocating 6.4 million Euros in support of Supreme Audit Institutions (SAI), Parliaments, Parliamentarians &Civil Society Organizations in the PALOP and Timor-Leste in the domain of external control of public expenditure and accounts. This project aims at promoting economic governance in the PALOP and TL strengthening technical and functional skills of Supreme Audit Institutions (SAIs), National Parliaments and Civil Society in the six beneficiary countries. The project is fully funded by the European Union through the 10th EDF A envelope in support, among others, of Supreme Audit Institutions (SAI), Parliaments, Parliamentarians and Civil Society Organizations in Angola, Cabo Verde, Guinea Bissau, Mozambique, São Tomé and Principe (PALOP Countries) and Timor-Leste.
The project is consistent with PALOP partner countries’ national strategies for poverty reduction and national development plans, with UNDP Country Programmes and Development Frameworks, and the 2008-2013 10th EDF for the PALOP & TL. These policies and strategies are adapted to the specificities and priorities of each country, but converge to promote good governance as an important support for development and economic growth.
This is achieved, in particular, through the strengthening of capacities in:
(i) legislative and oversight functions of the State;(ii) the management system of public finances, including internal and external control;(iii) support services to Parliament and (iv) State’s accountability.The multi-country intervention logic of this project aims to intensify the PALOP and Timor-Leste dialogue, drawing on the holistic approach to democratic governance. A special emphasis placed on joint, transversal, south-south and peer-to-peer capacity-building within the selected areas of economic governance, namely external control, audit and oversight capacities of the public finances.
The project will use training actions as a tool to enhance skills and credentials of stakeholders for controlling public finances while establishing eLearning platforms in Portuguese ensuring means of durable access to existing database and information in Portuguese. The project will also contribute to establishing a first time multi-country CSO PALOP-TL platform showcasing lessons and progress made by civil society organisations’ within the PALOP/CPLP Open Budget Initiative. Other activities aiming to promote sustainability will complement and support the OSAI CPLP multi-country plan and promote cooperation with the Training Institute for Financial and Economic Management in Portuguese Language (IGEF), involving this institution in training and capacity building activities at transnational level (joint learning involving actors from all beneficiary countries).
Improved access to information (in terms of availability of information, quality of the information available) is a pre-condition for effective public oversight and therefore to achieve the project’s key outputs. In the long run, the project impact will depend on the success of its exit strategy and sustainability of its actions and activities. It is critical that the project beneficiaries develop synergies and dynamics that will still be there after the end of the project. This will be best done through capacity development of human resources within national institutions. Such capacity development needs to target professional skills and enhancement/development of in-house training capacities in the field of external control of public accounts and finances, in particular CAs in the PALOP and Timor-Leste.
The overall objective is to promote economic governance in the PALOP and Timor-Leste (TL) strengthening technical and functional skills of SAIs, Parliaments, Parliamentarians and Civil Society (including media).
The specific objective is to improve the effectiveness of external political, judicial and civilian control of public finances in the PALOP and TL for a more efficient use of public resources. SAIs play an important role to prevent mismanagement and corruption. Therefore, whenever possible, the project will also help strengthen the links between SAIs and other oversight agencies, in particular anti-corruption and procurement agencies.
This project will directly address good governance and democracy strengthening the accountability system with external and independent control of public finances standing as the specific objective. As part of the action, responding to the right of citizens to information, and cross cuttingly supporting the promotion of gender equity in public spending will yield transformational results to be sustained beyond the project life cycle (among others, training and sensitization activities on gender equality addressed to Parliaments and CSOs). UNDP will associate UN Women units at country office level in designing the AWPs and training activities. ICT platforms and solutions will play a central role in this strategy and will be transversal to the action (among others, use of videoconference and IT tools). Environmental issues will be taken into consideration in specific activities when appropriate and consistent with partner countries’ national strategies and priorities, such as the strengthening of oversight capacities in the natural resource extraction domain in Mozambique.
The project foresees two results directly contributing to the specific objective:
SAIs’ control and audit capacities over public finances in the PALOP and TL are strengthened in a context of joint learning;Parliaments and Civil Society oversight capacities over public finances are developed for an informed analysis of public finances in the PALOP and TL in a context of joint learning.The strategy defined by the project takes into account the different contexts of the six beneficiary countries and the multi-country PALOP and TL cooperation intervention logic. The strategy will seek to improve political, judicial and civilian control and oversight of government action and public accounts through actions benefiting SAIs, Parliaments and CSOs.
The action plan includes multi-country activities fostering the south-south PALOP-TL cooperation (face-to-face and eLearning training, workshops, study trips and peer learning initiatives) and national activities aimed at addressing specificities of each beneficiary country (training, organizational changes, drafting of manuals, capacity development, etc.).
The implementation of the foreseen activities during the three-year project’s duration period will be articulated on the basis of annual work plans. Project start-up will have an initial phase of a maximum of four months from the signature of the Contribution Agreement with UNDP. In this inception phase annual work plans will be developed in a participatory manner and approved for each country, identifying accurately the pivotal countries and triggers of a change dynamics supporting the project’s sustainability strategy.
Description of the assignment
A Gender responsive budgeting (GRB) is an indispensable element in the process of mainstreaming the gender perspective, as recommended in the Beijing Conference (1995). This process considers the intervention of different actors in their different stages; from the moment of conceptualization of policies to evaluation, through programme design, development of plans and budgets, design of the implementation methodology, etc.
GRB is national planning and budgeting that contributes to the advancement in the field of gender equality and the effective enforcement of the rights of women planning. It involves the identification and thinking on the need to bridge gender gaps in sectorial and local government policies, plans and budgets interventions. It also aims to examine the differential impact on men and women of policies to increase income and allocation of internal resources and Official Development Assistance.
In 2010, the ICIEG (Cabo Verdean Institute for Gender Equality and Gender Equity) with the support of UN Women initiated a process of making a diagnosis of the situation in Cabo Verde regarding the promotion of gender equity in planning and in the national budget. This assessment identified the shortcomings in government’s formulation of strategies, planning and budgeting models and resulted in the development of an Action Plan for the implementation of a Gender responsive budgeting and Planning Programme (PGRB), involving various government sectors, parliament and organized civil society.
Taking into account the critical role of Parliament to approve the state budget and oversee its implementation, one of the strategies adopted was to further work with the National Parliament, in particular with the Network of Women Parliamentarians.
In this context a UNDP project funded by the European Union to support electoral cycles in the PALOP and Timor-Leste (ACP Portuguese Speaking Countries), Pro PALOP-TL, developed this specific component in partnership with the UN-Women Office in Cabo Verde, which ensured the methodological and conceptual orientation of actions and in the implementation of the following three major activities:
The Training Workshop on "Gender and women's empowerment", which was attended by representatives of the Network of Women Parliamentarians of Mozambique (4), Portugal (2), São Tomé and Príncipe (4) and Cabo Verde (16). The workshop allowed deep discussions, peer learning and exchanges of experiences resulting in drafting of national PGRBs and the role of parliaments in this area (Sep / Oct 2012);A one-day awareness / training workshop delivered to MPs with the aim to increase knowledge and sensitivity and Cabo Verde parliamentarians on PGRB, to stimulate the application of gender analysis to greater efficiency and effectiveness in resource allocation and budget decisions (Nov 2012). 30 MPs attended the workshop, were informed and got acquainted with the main data and gender indicators in Cabo Verde, and how these indicators are used in planning and budgeting exercises; reflected on the different stages of planning and budgeting and the roles of the different stakeholders in the process, identifying potential opportunities to promote gender equality within the budget cycle; got to know the key tools and proposals for Parliament to work with PGRB, as well as case studies, good practices and practical examples developed in other countries;A study visit by the Network of Women Parliamentarians of Cabo Verde to Brazil Senate to get to know the experience of the Women's Caucus in the Brazilian Senate regarding the action and follow-up of the latest in PGRB (Nov 2013).In order to further developed and enhance the process and work carried out by UNDP and UN Women with the Network of Women Parliamentarians and Parliament in general, also considering the need to effectively setup and implement a Gender-sensitive Monitoring and Evaluation System targeting public expenditures and accounts, the UNDP project funded by the European Union for Strengthening Technical and Functional Skills of Supreme Audit Institutions (SAIs), National Parliaments and Civil Society for the control of public finances in the PALOPs and Timor-Leste (TL-Pro PALOPs IAS) is recruiting an senior expert to support parliament, Network of Women Parliamentarians and all relevant stakeholders design a public expenditures and accounts Gender-sensitive Monitoring and Evaluation System.
Objective of the assignment
The deliverables provided by the Expert in Gender and Parliament Budget and Expenditure oversight (Gender Expert) will allow the project to strengthen the capacity of Cabo Verde’s Network of Women Parliamentarians and Parliament to develop an efficient Gender responsive budget, public expenditures and accounts monitoring and evaluation system of activities and budget public expenditure. In line with the provisions set in the Project Document and Contribution Agreement signed between the European Union and UNDP in Cape Verde.
For detailed information, please refer to the Terms of Reference available in the following websites:
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