On the 8-10th December Srikant Patibandla from PAC's Citizen Action Support Group attended a workshop on 'Strengthening Citizen Engagement in Procurement: Reviewing Experiences, Identifying Challenges and Exploring Opportunities’ hosted jointly by Affiliatated Networks for Social Accounability - South Asia (ANSA-SA), the World Bank and the Institute of Governance Studies, BRAC University.

The workshop looked at methods to engage citizens at the earliest stages of the procurement process so monitoring takes place from the very start of the service delivery process chain hence saving a huge amount of cost since the highest levels of corruption are normally at this initial stage itself. Significant costs would also be saved in terms of negating the need for corrective measures borne from the output of faulty procurement processes.

PAC gave a presentation on our work on PMGSY rural roads social audit and monitoring by community volunteers. On-going roads were highlighted for a better understanding of procurement of construction material.

Other case study presentations were given by participating organisations, including:

m      In Philippines ANSA in partnership with local organizations has monitored school text books at the procurement stage through civic engagement. This has resulted in fair distribution of text books and made the communities a partner within the procurement and distribution of text books. Further a lot of money was also saved because of active civic engagement. Similarly, examples were drawn from Latin America.

m      From India, CYSD team presented the process of conducting social audit of NREGS scheme in select districts in Orissa.

m      Similarly the World Bank, Delhi presented a process of civic monitoring and engagement with regard to CDD projects in various states.

m      Robeat Firdous from Dhaka University presented the role of media in ensuring accountability. He stated that effective usage of media is essential in order to ensure accountability from the government.

We would like to express our sincere Thanks to the hosts for giving this valuable opportunity to exchange ideas on this important theme.