Event starts: July 22, 2021 8:00 am
Ends: July 23, 2021 5:00 pm
More information
In February 2021, Uganda concluded the election cycle and new leaders were elected into various positions of responsibility across the country. Several leaders at Higher and Lower Local Government assumed office for the first time in these positions. The new leaders have entered into a social contract with the citizens who entrusted them with the mandate to represent them and therefore leaders need to understand their core roles and responsibilities in the governance of their respective Local Governments.
This virtual training serves as an induction training for Lower Local Councilors to enhance their knowledge in the areas of participation, accountability, responsiveness to the demands of the citizens, gender inclusiveness and Local Government systems.
Event report
VIRTUAL TRAINING OF LIRA LOWER LOCAL COUNCILS
On 22nd and 23rd July 2021, The SPACE Project held a virtual essential and basic induction training for lower local councilors in line with its goal of making the lower local councils in our six action districts more effective, more autonomous, more democratic and better equipped to perform their leadership roles in their respective local communities.
The training was as correspondingly diverse as the duties and powers at local councils, and covered a range of topics including Uganda’s decentralization system, the local government budget cycle, understanding good governance, accountability, service delivery, gender-responsiveness, and the leadership code of conduct.
Some of the key highlights from the training;
- Service delivery is a shared responsibility between citizens and leaders and both parties have critical roles to play right from the planning of services to allocation of resources, to implementation of programmes, as well as monitoring & evaluation of these programmes.
- Elected leaders or public officials must always be accountable to citizens during their time of service. Leaders ought to allow for public scrutiny into what they do while in office and they must ensure that citizens have access to authentic information.
- The promotion of gender-responsiveness and inclusion is a collective responsibility for leaders at all levels starting with the family as the basic unit of society and moving on to those in public positions at different levels. All these play critical roles in bridging the gender divide especially where it undermines the rights of women and girls or men and boys and holds them back from realizing their full potential. Understanding gender responsiveness is therefore important for leaders because they play a vital role in determining the roles and responsibilities and status/conditions of women, men, girls and boys in a given society.
Speaking about the leadership code of conduct & ethical leadership, our consultant Perry Aritua called for introspection among the participants on questions like how to influence others; developmental skills and knowledge required to serve successfully in their leadership roles; and how these can be used as goals for leadership development.
There were a number of technical challenges encountered mainly by the participants. Some of these include poor network, power outages and poor technical infrastructure especially for participants in off-grid areas. Despite these hiccups, we were able to keep online participants engaged. They shared their experiences and sought further guidance on technical concepts and processes at the local government level, how to handle supplementary budgets, their powers in local meetings and implementation plans.
Participants also appreciated the way the training was structured which simplified learning and the uptake of technical information. They encouraged the adoption of virtual trainings especially during this pandemic.
Should any of our participants require specific or additional clarification in regard to the training we are delighted to give them a phone call and discuss further.
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