Under the Governance and Development programme, PSAf carried out a number of initiatives to enhance the ability and capacity of citizens, media, civil society organisations and elected representatives to use evidence-based approaches to engage with state actors on governance issues.
The ultimate goal of these interventions is to promote transparent, responsive, accountable and effective governance.
With support from the Overseas Development Institute (ODI)’s Governance and Transparency Fund, PSAf supported a number of civil society and media institutions to implement different governance initiatives focusing on women, youth, children and persons with disabilities. In January, the organisation approved phase to funding to three institutions in Zambia, namely 2410, Petauke Explorer radio station and Yatsani Radio, which are all implementing activities under the Atwaambe initiative.
Additional funding has also been approved to support national level linkages and uptake of issues that the 10 grantees are addressing at the grassroots level. PSAf will lead the process of facilitating platforms for national level dialogue and forums. It will also support media based grantees, who are mostly community radio stations, in ensuring that they effectively provide a platform for constructive engagement to all stakeholders at grassroots level in voicing out issues around the topical governance issues around women, youth, children and persons with disabilities that are being addressed in the different project sites.
In January, the organisation also supported three weekly interactive radio programmes that sought to give a voice to marginalised groups namely children, persons with disabilities and rural women. The programmes were aired on Wednesdays on Radio Phoenix.
In light of the ongoing constitution making process in Zambia, PSAf facilitated an interacted radio programme on involvement of persons with disability in the crafting of the country’s supreme law. This generated a lot of interest among callers who felt there was room for improvement in terms of involving persons with disability in the constitution making process. What came out strongly during the programme was that there were inadequate systems to involve persons with disability in the constitution making process, calling for urgent interventions.
PSAf also facilitated a radio discussion on how different stakeholders can contribute towards the achievement of a child friendly national agenda.
This morning, we are discussing the importance of stakeholders engaging the media and duty bearers to achieve a national child friendly agenda. The discussion was inspired by the apparent absence of children’s voices even in issues that affect them. the panellists and callers raised issues around access to the media by children, noting that children especially those in rural areas are not able to access media products that can inform them and empower them to take part in development discourse.
