Country: Guinea (AFR)
Project: Building Civil Society Capacity to Engage in State Reform Programs
Organization: Search for Common Ground (SFCG)
Sector: Human Development – Health (50%), Education (40%), and Social Protection (10%)

This PPP is open for public comments until August 6, 2016. Please use the comment section below. 

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Data Sheet

I. PROJECT DEVELOPMENT OBJECTIVES

A. PDO

The objective of this project is to enhance accountability in the use of post-Ebola recovery funds by strengthening citizen oversight of budgets and service delivery through social accountability tools at both local and national level, and disseminating information on the post-Ebola recovery process to raise awareness among the public of the recovery process in Guinea.
Guinea’s post-Ebola recovery efforts face several challenges, including limited accountability in rural areas, fragile state-society relations, and weak provision of social services (health, education, and social protection). To ensure an effective recovery, Search For Common Ground (SFCG) is proposing to: (1) build civil society and government capacity to jointly monitor budgets and service delivery at the local level; (2) establish regional-level coalitions to facilitate spaces for dialogue in vulnerable communities; (3) disseminate information on the post-Ebola recovery process through media outreach activities at both local and national level; and (4) generate citizen feedback on the implementation of the post-Ebola recovery plan.

B. Project Beneficiaries

The Project’s direct beneficiaries include: all residents living in the most affected Ebola communities in Basse Guinée and Guinée Forestière, which cover 41% of the country. At the community level, the project will work with key groups including: traditional authorities, women and youth representatives, parent teacher associations, economic operators and other interest groups, as well as with professional unions and associations among education and medical staff. The project will also engage with and benefit health and education prefectural directorates (DPS and DPEs) that are in charge of implementing health and education programs at the local level. At the national level, the project will generate information that will benefit the Government’s Post Ebola Socio-economic Recovery and Resiliency Plan (PESRRP). The information generated will also benefit the Government Reform and Administrative Modernization Program (PREMA), a program that focuses on enhancing the effectiveness of public sector reforms.

The Project’s indirect beneficiaries include: all Guinean citizens, the Project Monitoring Technical Unit (CTSP) at the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Education (MoE), the Ministry of Health (MoH), and the National Assembly. Guinean citizens will benefit from the success of the project because the national post-Ebola recovery program and the delivery of social services will become more transparent and accountable following the project intervention. The information generated by the project will complement and support the CTSP work in monitoring the implementation of public sector reforms at the local level. The MoE and MoH will benefit from gaining a better understanding on beneficiaries’ priorities and the performance levels of education and health service delivery units at the local level. The National Assembly will benefit as well by having information that will allow it to better monitor the impact of the post-Ebola recovery plan on the ground.

II. PROJECT DESCRIPTION

A. Project Components

Component 1: Strengthen government and civil society capacity to design, implement and monitor budget allocation and spending, and basic service delivery
This component focuses on overcoming capacity constraints of key government and civil society actors involved in the post-Ebola recovery. This entails providing tailored capacity building support to build and expand knowledge, skills, and organizational capabilities of government and civil society in order to identify and address service delivery bottlenecks in each targeted region. In addition, this component will also replicate the SFCG’s well-established National CSO Accountability Platform (CSOAP) in each targeted region in order to enhance coordination mechanisms among stakeholders, support social accountability activities, and act as a link between national and regional level activities. The activities that will be implemented to support these processes include:

(a) Conducting participatory capacity-gap identification with the CSOAP and government actors in Basse Guinée and Guinée Forestière.
(b) Providing training to CSOAP and national government actors in advanced budget analysis techniques.
(c) Creating integrated Regional CSO Accountability Platform (RCSOAPs)
(d) Providing tailored capacity building to RCSOAPs and relevant government actors to implement advanced budget analysis techniques at the local level.
(e) Convening and coaching RCSOAPs meetings.
(f) Developing and pilot scorecard methodology, and supporting its implementation in targeted regions.
(g) Organizing quarterly scorecard methodology meeting with partners.

Component 2: Create opportunities for government and civil society actors to leverage findings of budget and service delivery monitoring to improve basic services
This component is geared towards creating spaces for dialogue and constructive engagement between citizens, government authorities, and service providers to analyze and evaluate the impact of the post-Ebola recovery process. The focus will be on assessing the performance and quality of service delivery in health and education facilities in targeted regions. Citizen feedback and budget information generated through social accountability tools will be leveraged to inform discussions and policy-making. This entails:

(a) Organizing public meetings in targeted areas to discuss community scorecards and budget analysis findings, review progress, and agree on measures to improve service delivery at the local level.
(b) Facilitating the participation of local groups to use scorecards findings to inform local communal budgets.
(c) Mobilizing citizens and gathering support to increase health spending to 10% of the national budget.

Component 3: Generate and disseminate credible and accurate information on the recovery process to those most affected by the crisis

This component focuses on developing a participatory communication strategy to disseminate the information generated by the project to the wider population in order to raise awareness about the recovery process at both the community and national level. Multiple media outlets will be used to reach the wider population. This will entail:

(a) Developing a project participatory strategic communications strategy.
(b) Producing and broadcasting a TV Series named “Questions with the Ministry” on the recovery process.
(c) Organizing public meetings to share information on service delivery, discuss progress, and collect citizen feedback in targeted regions.
(d) Developing and disseminating simplified budget guides to raise population awareness and elicit participation.
(e) Partnering with local radio stations to disseminate information about the post-Ebola recovery, announce location and time of upcoming events, and invite citizens to participate in project activities at the community level.

Component 4: Identify and share lessons drawn to foster socially accountable crisis recovery in other multi-stakeholder, conflict-affected environments.
The objectives of this component are to support capacity building of CSO partners to implement project activities and to share lessons learned with actors working on social accountability in fragile contexts. This will be accomplished by:

(a) Organizing multi-stakeholder learning and evaluation meetings every six months.
(b) Providing institutional capacity building support to CSO partners.
(c) Showcasing case studies and organizing peer learning exchanges with CSOs and colleagues from other countries in the region.
(d) Supporting youth-led participatory study on their priorities within the education and health sectors.
(e) Disseminating findings of the final evaluation of the program.

B. Project Financing

The financing instrument elected for this project is a Recipient Executed Trust Fund (RETF) Grant. The source of financing for this Grant is the Global Partnership for Social Accountability (GPSA), housed within the World Bank. As per World Bank Trust Fund guidelines, given that this Trust Fund is smaller than US$5 million this Project is subject to World Bank procedures related to project preparation and supervision of Small RETF Grants. The Project cost is estimated to be US$800,000 to be financed completely by the GPSA grant. Additionally, the World Bank will commit an annual Project supervision budget in the amount of US$20,000 per year.

III. IMPLEMENTATION

A. Implementation Arrangements

Project Implementing Agency: The Project will be led and coordinated by Search For Common Ground (SFCG). The organization will be responsible for the overall management and implementation of project activities, project monitoring, and internal evaluations. SFCG will review and ensure the quality of: (a) the design and methodology of budget analysis and participatory scorecards; (b) constructive engagement processes with users, service providers, and government authorities; (c) information disseminated through media outreach; and (d) linkages between the national CSO accountability platform and RCSOAPs. SFCG has extensive experience working in these themes in Guinea, as demonstrated by its track record. It has worked extensively on diversifying the media landscape, supporting existing democratic processes, and strengthening the capacity of targeted stakeholders to contribute to informed dialogue and build constructive engagements with government authorities. SFCG has a unique two-pronged approach to overcome challenges in fragile environments. It consists of working with the media sector and, on a parallel track, implementing on-the-ground community outreach through local capacity building and networking activities. Furthermore, this project builds up on the work that SFCG has implemented with the World Bank under the Governance and Accountability in the Public Sector Program.

During the Project implementation, SFCG will partner with one national CSO and two media outlets to ensure the success of the project. AGUIDE, a leading national CSO, will be responsible for convening and monitoring RCSOAPs within the target regions. The two media outlets are Radio Télévision Guinéenne (RTG) and Radio Rurale Guinea (RGG) and they will lead national media production and local radio discussions respectively. Partnerships will be structured using a “mutual accountability model” that sets performance benchmarks for each partner, including SFCG. In addition, SFCG will leverage a Steering Committee of key stakeholders, which was established under the Governance and Accountability in the Public Sector Program, to ensure buy-in and strategic alignment. This committee includes PREMA, the CTSP project management unit at MoF, PREMA, the National Assembly, the World Bank, and SFCG.

Flow of Funds: SFCG will directly draw down on the Designated Account in order to ensure smooth flow of funds for implementation of Project activities. An Indicative Schedule of Advanced Payments and Final Reimbursement will be included in the Disbursement Letter. Requests for withdrawal of Grant funds will be made in accordance with a schedule (milestones) agreed between SFCG and the World Bank.

B. Results Monitoring and Evaluation

SFCG and the World Bank will monitor the PDO level indicators, as well as the implementation of activities supported by each Project component. SFCG will develop a comprehensive, participatory monitoring and evaluation plan in collaboration with its Steering Committee. Progress will be monitored against a baseline collected at the start of the project. Monitoring activities will be conducted using a suite of tools aimed at maximizing value-for-money and ensuring implementation on time and of the highest technical quality. This includes results-based management systems at the individual, project, and country-level. Specific tools will include: (a) routine focus-group testing of media products, (c) pre and post-tests for all training activities, (d) standardized training and community activity reporting, (e) weekly financial spending analysis, and (f) mutual accountability benchmarks agreed by all partner organizations.
The focus of the evaluation will focus on assessing the effectiveness of RCSOAPs and the degree to which beneficiaries are informed about the post-Ebola recovery and perceive tangible improvements in the delivery of social services. Results generated in target regions will be crosschecked against a control group of regions to gauge the overall project effectiveness. Furthermore, a qualitative youth-to-youth study will be implemented to triangulate results.

C. Sustainability

The Project seeks to establish sustainability through institutionalization and acculturation. SFCG will partner with government stakeholders and media outlets from the outset to ensure that the proposed social accountability mechanism can be integrated into their regular annual planning. In addition, Regional CSO Accountability Platforms (RCSOAPs) will work under Terms of Reference (TORs) that are owned by the participating organizations and can be achievable without additional resources beyond the project lifecycle. In terms of acculturation, the engagement with the media outlets is expected to foster cultural change by promoting openness and transparency, and dialogue between government and citizens as a pragmatic approach to solve problems.