Why is Good Governance important for civil society alliances?
Adopting and promoting good governance principles demonstrates a willingness to build trust and confidence both within the alliance and with partners such as the communities the alliance represents. It is also important that when demanding others be held to account for their commitments and actions around nutrition we hold ourselves to the same standards and communicate these standards openly. The SUN civil society alliance model aims to develop consensus among all actors in the scaling up nutrition movement with civil society viewed as an equal partner that has a mandate to communicate feedback and constructive critique to government as well as playing a supporting and coordinating role. In turn government support for and understanding of civil society alliance objectives can lead to real changes in policy and practice.
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Case study: Building a stronger voice for civil society through one platform in Sierra Leone
“With these systems in place we are confident that we are moving in the right direction towards championing nutrition, health and immunization acceleration through a stronger civil society movement.”
The Health and Nutrition Sierra Leone Civil Society Platform - HaNSL-CSP hosted by FOCUS 1000 in collaboration with Helen Keller International and Catholic Relief Services. It has a National Coordinating Body (NCB) comprised of 11 organizations which include international and national NGO partners. The NCB provides oversight in the governance, management and coordination of the platform as well as streamlining communication between the platform and external audiences such as government, donors and other development partners. They hold bi annual national meetings and are responsible for providing relevant information to members. The HaNSL Terms of Reference was developed with organizational structures, roles, responsibilities and code of conduct clearly laid out for national and district bodies. Each of the 13 districts in Sierra Leone are in the process of setting up district level platforms coordinated by a District Coordinating Body (DCB) responsible for activities and mobilizing grass root efforts. Appointing up to 7 members with a chair and deputy, each body has immunization and nutrition focal points to oversee activities. The DCB is required to endorse an organization within the body to represent their interest to the NCB as well as provide regular updates. They are also responsible for holding monthly coordination meetings bringing together government, donor and development partners at district level. The DCB is accountable to the NCB. The wider group known as the general body (GB) consists of all civil society groups including grass root organizations such as market women, fisher folk, sports groups and youth organizations, representing the voice of communities across the country. To improve the capacity of HaNSL CSP partners and facilitate effective information flow, a series of products have been developed. These include a platform Google group for regular information exchange, a website [focus 1000.org/HANSLCSP] for sharing Sierra Leone’s experience and to act as a resource centre where members and visitors can access materials, news, articles and research documents. A quarterly newsletter with updates, successes and challenges was also launched in September.