Mid-Term Review of the AGIR Programme - Sida

2 F I N D I N G S
tive of Rede da Criança, with experience in receiving and managing funds, was still
noting the very low amount of funding received from headquarters. This has, on one
occasion, forced it to fund an activity of the network in Nampula related to AGIR
with its own resources. The Juvenile Parliament also expressed its concerns about a
lack of funding to local level activities. These are some examples showing that the
implementation of the partners’ activities at the local level is still a critical point, despite
attempts to solve this problem.
The problem of funds reaching the local level is being addressed with more consistency
this year in the sub-programme managed by Diakonia as a result of its monitoring
field missions. The evaluation team had access to 8 out of 9 partners’ action
plans, dated September 2012 (CEDE (Centre for Studies on Democracy and Development),
Electoral Observatory, LDH, AMMCJ (Association of Mozambican Women
in Legal Career), Rede CAME, Juvenile Parliament, MULEIDE (Association for
Women, Law and Development). These plans include the decentralisation of funds,
involvement of local level partner organisations’ branches or network members in the
planning process for 2013, and a mobilisation of funds by the latter to be more autonomous
from the central level. This is a signal that the programme is well-aware of this
gap, but with only two years remaining until the end of the programme, local-level
CSOs will need extra effort to yield results attributable to the implementation of
AGIR. If the experience with the central level has shown that it took almost two years
for most of the organisations to be acquainted with good governance and management
practices, and this was learned and improved by doing, it would be expected that the
implementation of the programme at the local level will face similar problems – an
even more challenging process taking into account the capacity constraints that exist
at this level.
Implementation of CSO workplans
The implementation of the work plans has evolved. At the beginning of 2010, the
workplan was only partially implemented. In the subsequent years, the level of implementation
increased, although planned activities were not always implemented.
Reporting on the work plans tends to analyse challenges and constraints and less the
level of implementation. There were also cases of mismanagement that resulted in the
suspension of the partners (MISA, MONASO MEPT) and a reduced pace of implementation.
CSO Partner Activities
When it comes to partners, the consistency of activities regarding their contribution to
the programme’s outcomes is sometimes not clear. AGIR agrees with partner organisations
on a set of activities aligned to the objectives of the programme, or of the subprogrammes.
Initially, the selection of these partners was made based on the fact that
the partners had a strategic plan that overlaps with AGIR objectives or a history of
intervention in the relevant areas. Therefore, the activities of these CSOs theoretically
cannot fall outside the scope of AGIR. But since AGIR funds the CSO’s strategic
plan through a process of good donorship, there can be cases where activities might
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