Boosting citizen participation and engagement in the management of local affairs (SNYDK0005)
Overview
At-a-Glance
Action Plan: Action plan – Yoff, Senegal, 2024 – 2027
Inception Report: Not available
Commitment Start: Jan 2025
Commitment End: Jan 2027
Institutions involved:
- Mayor
- Yoff Town Hall/Planning Division
- Youth and Education Office
- Social and Solidarity Economy Office
- Enda ECOPOP
- Article 19
- APECSY
- ARD of Dakar
- Sub-prefect of Almadies
- Neighborhood councils
- Neighborhood delegates
- Youth Associations
- Women
- Yoff Disabled People
- Badjenou Gokh(Women health outreach agents)
Primary Policy Area:
Primary Sector:
OGP Value:
- Access to information
- Civic Participation
- Public Accountability
- Technology and Innovation for Transparency and Accountability
Description
Commitment ID
SNYDK0005
Commitment Title
Boosting citizen participation and engagement in the management of local affairs
Problem
The municipality of Yoff has thus far implemented several initiatives to promote participatory development. Despite the efforts of the town hall, the involvement of residents in development projects remains low. The municipality is facing a lack of ownership and buy- in of several community projects due to the absence of fluid communication between the town hall, neighborhood committees and citizens. Added to this, is the failure to take into account the priorities outlined during the 2022 budget orientation debates and the absence of reliable interlocutors when the mayor visits certain neighborhoods. In addition, the financial resources available for development projects are often limited, which hinders the implementation of ambitious projects. These identified problems show that it is important to strengthen community participation, improve transparency and provide adequate resources to ensure sustainable development in Yoff.
Status quo
The current level of participatory development in Yoff certainly shows positive signs but also challenges to be met. Indeed, the Yoff town hall, in partnership with Enda ECOPOP, recently organized a training session for elected officials and municipal agents on their roles and responsibilities in the context of decentralization and participatory budgeting; projects designed to improve the living environment of local populations are launched, such as the creation of 7/7 football fields and a development and leisure area for residents; and participatory diagnostic workshops are often organized. Notwithstanding these initiatives, the involvement of residents in municipal projects remains limited. This is materialized by a lack of maintenance of public facilities but also a low participation in the exchange frameworks offered by the town hall. Consequently, it is necessary to strengthen awareness and active participation of communities in order to guarantee truly inclusive and effective participatory development in Yoff. And this will be done through the participatory budget approach and other innovative participatory mechanisms .
Action
Promoting citizen participation and engagement in the management of local affairs involves the implementation of democratic mechanisms for inclusive and sustainable development of the commune of Yoff. These are mechanisms such as:
Promote civic culture;
Raising awareness among citizens about participatory budgeting and the role of the municipal council;
Implement participatory budgets;
Establish mechanisms for evaluating municipal policies and for accountability;
Leveraging ICT to report to citizens and gather their feedback
List associations and their areas of expertise;
Digitalization of tax revenues for better mobilization of financial resources;
Implement a budget monitoring and execution tool to improve municipal management and strengthen the skills of its stakeholders.
How will the commitment contribute to solving the public problem described above?
Promoting participation and citizen engagement is fundamental in the management of local affairs. It allows the co-construction of fair, inclusive and sustainable development projects in order to improve the living conditions of local populations, but also to strengthen the democratic and social structures of communities. In the commune of Yoff where citizen engagement is still to be improved, the promotion of participatory governance mechanisms is a necessity. Raising awareness among local populations on the tools, principles and techniques of participatory democracy will thus help to strengthen the civic culture which is a prerequisite for engagement. Awareness-raising activities will be accompanied by participatory democracy experiences such as the establishment of the participatory budget, accountability exercises and periodic communication on the initiatives of the commune by using new information and communication technologies to raise the level of participation and engagement of local communities.
What long-term goal as identified in your Open Government Strategy does this commitment relate to?
This commitment is part of Axis 4 of the Mayor's strategic vision: Promoting open governance for better citizen participation and relates to the strategic objective “Promoting participatory development”
Primary Policy Area
Civic Space
Primary Sector
Cross-sectoral
What OGP value is this commitment relevant to?
| Access to information | Access to information is a fundamental pillar of participation and citizen engagement. The participatory budget makes access to information a credo of responsible democratic governance to promote transparency, accountability and credibility in public action. To this end, the municipality of Yoff has set up a set of mechanisms for the production, communication and dissemination of information. |
| Civic Participation | In a democratic process, civic participation in community affairs is a requirement. It allows the authority to probe the legitimate aspirations of local populations and adapt its policy according to priorities for better social acceptance. Through civic participation, the co-creation of local policy takes on meaning and content for better social acceptability of projects. |
| Public Accountability | Public accountability ensures that development projects are carried out transparently, fairly and truly meet the needs of communities. Through accountability exercises, such as public hearings, dialogue days and citizen questioning, citizens have the opportunity to directly question the mayor or municipal team on their management, which promotes mutual understanding of concerns. The municipality of Yoff, aware of this requirement of modern public governance, makes accountability a regular exercise in order to build citizen confidence. |
| Technology and Innovation for Transparency and Accountability | Integrating technologies and innovations in participatory development initiatives induces more transparency, accountability and inclusion, thus promoting more efficient and equitable governance. These technologies overcome the physical constraints relating to citizen participation in the management of local affairs. Because they offer the possibility of providing quality public services to citizens. Similarly, the dematerialization of services, an innovation in service delivery, promotes transparency and speed in files processing. Therefore, the municipality of Yoff will rely on a number of initiatives: •Implementing a digital municipal communication network (Sunu Gox ); •Creating YouTube channels, FB and Instagram pages; |