Page Title

CPI The Lebanese Center for Public Information

PARTICIPATIVE
GOVERNANCE

PARTICIPATIVE GOVERNANCE

24. Monitoring the Budget

Budget monitoring

udget monitoring

will

soon become the

subject

of the day

in the

Middle

East.

The wind of revolt and the need for a true democracy that

currently

sweeping the Arab Machrek and Maghreb will

give added

legitimacy to

the

demands

the

citizens

oversee directly

the

age

of public funds

in their country.

These demands increased

after

he revelations of

the huge

dilapidations

ublic

funds by unscrupulous dictators like Ben Ali,

Mobarak and

Kaddafi

, and the cohorts that they assembled around

them for that

purpose.

But budget monitoring is a science

that must be learnt like any other

one

The young and the no so young revolutionaries will have to go or

return to

school, sooner or later, to learn the techniques, or at least

some elements

of them,

that will

enable them

oversee the usage

of billions of dollars

public funds

their country.

In Lebanon budget monitoring by the citizens is largely unknown. The

Authorities have never encouraged the citizens in this direction nor

have

they been willing to share some essential information with them

relative to

the budget.

Obviously a great deal has to be done to remedy this situation.

To start with, all our universities should include, in their curriculum, the

study of participative governance, the national budget and the

national

plan.

Furthermore our NGOs should consider conducting regular

internships on

these subjects.

The ultimate objectives of these internships

should

be the creation of

National Plan and a National Budget Monitoring Citizens' Authority.

To provide an example of the introduction of budget monitoring for the first

time in a country we publish below some extracts from the “Philippines National

Budget Monitoring Report”. For the readers who would be interested to learn

more on the subject we recommend accessing the site at http://pdf.usaid.

gov/pdf_docs/PDACO770.pdf

Philippines National Budget Monitoring Project

Key results.

Capacity-building was accomplished through the project’s training program,
the experience in applied budget monitoring gained under the small grants
program, extension training funded by the small grants, and network meetings.

In addition the establishment of the network begins to build collective capacity
among Philippine CSOs to monitor the national budget on a sustained basis.

The improvement in capacity is evidenced by the self-assessment scores,
partners’ products, and interview data.

The project produced a small but committed pool of people trained in basic
budget monitoring skills, with hands-on experience in budget monitoring, and a
somewhat larger pool of NGO activists and journalists, at both national and
local levels, with better awareness of budget monitoring as a tool for
accountability and improved skills.

In turn these activists are now more capable of evidence-based advocacy,
and better prepared to address emerging budget issues. It also produced a
set of tools for budget monitoring for specific issues areas and constituencies
in the Philippines. Reports and interviews indicate that the project’s capacity-
building components were highly valued by the beneficiaries.

The amount and quality of information increased in several respects:

First, the project produced general information on the national budget
process and content, and on how to monitor the national budget.

For example, the project generated and has made available an inventory of
the major sources of national budget information, including information on
every key government document, its agency source, and its content.

This inventory appears to be a unique resource in the Philippines. The
network and several grantees published manuals or papers on various
procedural and substantive aspects of monitoring (such as how to read COA
reports, and how to monitor farm-to-market road projects).

Second, the project generated formative research on particular budget-
related issues. These included papers and publications on such sectors as
national government dispersal of budget funds for local water supply, agrarian
reform, socialized housing, agriculture and elections, and on such cross-
cutting issues as performance-based dispersal of national level funds, lump
sum and off-budget accounts, the opacity and gaps in the accountability of
public corporation and independent commission budgets, and the systemic
issue of the balance of power between the executive and congress with regard
to the national budget.

Third, project partners were able to uncover current problems with the budget
or budget process, such as executive overspending against the national
budget total. Information was disseminated through large and small, more
targeted events, the project website and list serve, partners’ websites, and
mass media (including articles and interviews of project team members, in print
and broadcast).

The project exceeded MSI’s expectations with regard to effecting changes in
policy and public institutions.

Philippines National Budget Monitoring Project

The strategy of the project

was to develop a whole that is greater than the sum of its pre-existing parts by:

Increasing awareness

of the centrality of the national budget to

governance and accountability;

Deepening capacity

in civil society to undertake budget

monitoring and use it as a tool for accountability; and

Prompting government to respon

to CSO monitoring and

advocacy by accepting at least some recommendations of or acting on

concerns raised by stakeholders in the national budget to make better

substantive policy choices and/or make budget processes more

transparent.

4. In terms of immediate beneficiaries, the project targeted groups

that were already working in areas related to budget monitoring, as

noted above.

But it was also designed to attract others that might

have an interest in the field but had not yet entered it

Similarly, it

was centered on Manila, on the assumption that most groups concerned

with the national budget would have offices there, but sought to reach

out to interested organizations outside the capital. In terms of inputs, the

project supported both training and applied practice in budget

monitoring in order to deepen and hasten project impact.