Sub-National Budget Transparency Survey

 Sub-National Budget Transparency Survey

 In furtherance of our objective to enthrone transparent, open and participatory budget regime in Nigeria, CIRDDOC has concluded arrangement including contract signing with DfID to consolidate on the successes of the Sub-national Open Budget Survey in 15 states – 6 (six) states supported by UNICEF and 9 (nine) states supported by SAVI/DfID as well as replicate same in the rest of the 21 states of the Federation. The CIRDDOC/DfID project with technical support from IBP Washington DC is intended to contribute to the enhancement of government accountability through transparency in budget planning and implementation. It entails conducting a survey of the level of transparency of the budget process in the states, analyzing data, scoring and ranking the performance of the 36 States.

The project is based on a detailed questionnaire that is intended to collect a comparative dataset on the public availability of budget information, procurement information and citizens’ level of participation in the budget process in the states. The survey will compare the level of performance of the 36 states on transparency in public access to a range of state government budget documents, public participation in budget processes, public access to information on procurement. To some extent, it is also supposed to measure the level of gender inclusion in the budget process.

To make this happen, CIRDOOC has recruited partners in the states in the ranks of Chief Consultant (1), Zonal Consultants (6), State Consultants (36) and State Researchers (36) through job-interview of applicants with strict selection criteria anchored on organisational cognate experience and institutional capacity. List of successful partners is attached below.

List of Partners

CIRDDOC also consulted with IBP in finalising the questionnaire and procured equipment including laptop computers which were distributed to the partners during the training workshops.

The training workshop for Researchers, Reviewers and Zonal Consultants from the 36 states of the Federation who were engaged to work on the SNBTS with CIRDDOC was designed to enhance the skills of the researchers, reviewers and zonal consultants and to familiarize them with the methodology for the survey which was co-facilitated by a resource person from the International Budget Partnership (IBP) Washington DC Ms. Elena Mondo, CIRDDOC Consultant Engr. Ralph Ndigwe and two other local resource persons (Dr Mike Anyanwokoro and Barr. Eze Onyekpere). The training which featured paper presentations, experience sharing and exercises was organized in two batches, one for the Southern partners held at Nike Lake Resort Hotel, Enugu on 22^nd and 23^rd January and the other one for the Northern partners held at Denis Hotel Abuja on 27^th and 28^th January 2014.

The ED, CIRDDOC and the representative of DFID and IBP in a Consultants in a group photograph with CIRDDOC ED, Project group photograph with the Southern states Partners at the Enugu Coordinator and the representatives of DFID and IBP Enugu workshop

The presentations at the workshops were on:

• Introduction to Open Budget Index
• Understanding the Budget Process at the sub-national level

Introduction to Methodology on state budget transparency in Nigeria and how to determine public availability of documents

Handing over of the laptops to the partners by the ED of CIRDDOC, and the representatives of DFID and IBP

Partners in a group photograph with the Project coordinator of     Cross section of the participants at the training workshop in CIRDDOC and the representative of IBP Abuja

The workshops (Enugu and Abuja) recorded 100% attendance and achieved the objectives. All the researchers, reviewers and zonal consultants participated fully as was evidenced in the interactive nature of the workshop. Participants had background knowledge of the budgeting system and this made the workshop exciting and productive.