The enactment of the new Constitution in Kenya in 2010 was a historic moment for the country's democratic development. At the heart of the new Constitution was devolution, creating 47 new county governments so that authorities can enhance the efficiency of public services, improve transparency and accountability of the government by being closer to citizens, and increase citizen participation in the overall governance process. As a direct result of the decentralized government system, citizens now have more incentives to be involved in the county budgetary oversight to ensure that resources are transparently and responsibly allocated.
Empowering citizens to participate in local governance is an important step for Kenyans to hold elected officials accountable and to ensure that public services are delivered. For this reason, the Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE) is partnering with local civil society organizations (CSOs) throughout Kenya to take an active role in the regional budget creation and monitoring processes. It quickly became evident to CIPE that it was fundamental to support these organizations to improve how they monitor and evaluate their processes in order to engage effectively and efficiently with decision makers.
CIPE and Panoply Digital-an information and communication technology (ICT) for development consulting firm-led a tech-enabled training workshop to teach strategies and introduce tools that could help build the capacity of partners to capture their efforts and self-evaluate how they can improve their approaches and activities moving forward. Read the "Empowering Inclusive Civic Engagements through Tech-Enabled Approaches and Tools in Kenya" case study to learn more about the common technology-related issues faced by CSOs, what tools and strategies they learned, and how they are using this knowledge to improve their programs, including taking proactive steps for cybersecurity.
Maiko Nakagaki is a Program Officer for Global Programs at the Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE).