Citizen Feedback Platform. (LR0022)

This will help further demonstra te the commitment of the Government to keep citizens in the know of the implement ation status of decisions they have made; this reduces misinterpretation of Government undertakings
Performance indicators
Number/proportion of citizens accessing and utilizing platform to request and receive feedbacks;

For Commitment details, see Liberia Progress Report 2015-2017.

4.1 Encourage Citizens’ feedback on national development outcomes

(MICAT, LISGIS, MOF, MOPT, MIA with support from GSM companies, iLab, CENTAL, All local radio stations; 10 August 2015- – 15 February 2016).

Milestones:

· 4.1.1 Build out online/SMS platform for receiving and gathering feedback

Commitment Aim:

This commitment aims to collect citizens’ feedback on project outcomes, spending and use of public services. Their input is to be solicited using SMS messaging from mobile phones and sent to government ministries, where public relations officers will collect the data and respond to user feedback. While citizens’ views on multiple sectors, such as health and education, are the desired outcome, the early focus will be collecting views on the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning.

This will better inform citizens about how money in the national and county development budgets is being spent by government ministries, agencies and commissions. The system will then allow civil society organizations (CSOs), development partners, and monitoring and evaluation arms of the government to measure project impacts against spending.

However, as written, this commitment does not specify how feedback will be used, or how citizens can actually influence decision making. Consequently, the potential impact will be minor.

Status

Midterm: Not Started

Implementation of this commitment has not started.

End-of-Term: Not Started

The government’s self-assessment report indicates this commitment has not started because of a lack of funding. Nonetheless, it is important to state that Accountability Lab has begun implementation of “Offline Citizen Helpdesks”[Note50: Citizen Helpdesks, http://citizenhelpdesk.org], a project that pioneers citizen feedback, dialogue and a community voice platform to ensure accountability in the development process. The project is working in two areas where large gold mining concessions have led to a variety of accountability challenges. Helpdesks are acting as a platform for shared understanding between communities, the local government and the concession companies, and as the basis for collective solutions to shared challenges in the natural resource management process. This process is used to ensure that everyone understands how and when development will take place, to build accountability into local decision making in real-time, and to close the feedback loop between citizens, governments, the media and the private sector.[Note51: Anthony K Selmah, iLab, interview by IRM researcher, November 2017.]

Did it Open Government?

Access to Information: Did Not Change

Civic Participation: Did Not Change

There is no progress to show for this commitment and it has not had any impact on changing government practice.

Carried forward?

This commitment was not carried forward.