Prime Minister's Adviser on International Affairs Dr Gowher Rizvi Monday said third-party monitoring of development activities makes a government accountable.
"Citizens' monitoring is good for development of a country… third-party monitoring of development activities makes a government accountable," he said while speaking at a workshop as the chief guest.
Manusher Jonno Foundation organised the workshop in a city hotel.
Mr Rizvi said the government alone cannot execute all the development projects. "The government wants to use all its resources for the development activities, but it is not possible without help of development partners."
He also urged third parties to continue monitoring the development activities.
Manusher Jonno Foundation Executive Director Shaheen Anam and Citizen Action for Results, Transparency and Accountability (CARTA) Programme Director Tjaarda Storm Van Leeuwen delivered welcome address at the programme.
They said the third-party monitoring (TPM) system has been introduced by the World Bank as an additional monitoring tool that complements internal monitoring systems of public projects.
TPM facilitates the collection of citizens' feedback on the implementation of public investment projects and improvements in service delivery, they said, adding that it helps gain a better understanding of which approaches work in practice and identify unintended consequences and utilise the knowledge of local communities.
The Word Bank funded TPM project in the framework of its Country Assistance Strategy (CAS). The title of this TPM project was Placing Vulnerable Groups at the Centre of Result Monitoring of WB- Supported Projects' initiative.
The idea of TPM was to test the method for independent monitoring of the CAS implementation by verifying in the field the attainment of selected indicators of the CAS results framework.
WB appointed Manusher Jonno Foundation (MJF) to carry out the TPM initiative under CAS. MJF partnered with four organisations to carry out TPM activities at grassroots level.
Additional Chief Engineer of Public Health Administration Monwar Ali spoke at the programme as the special guest.
Field level beneficiaries from different parts of the country also attended the workshop.
They shared experience and lessons learned from implementation of the CARTA programme which supported citizen engagement including independent monitoring of eleven World Bank projects in Bangladesh and Nepal.
They reviewed the impact of constructive engagement of CSOs at grassroots level in engaging citizens in service delivery, share knowledge and results stories on the use of social accountability approaches in the selected World Bank projects.
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