2.1 Development of the SNGP
On 11 May 2008, H.E. the President Hamid Karzai issued a decree ordering the development of a new Subnational Governance Policy. The decree ordered IDLG to lead the development process, in cooperation with the key ministries, directorates and commissions of the government, including the Ministries of: Agriculture, Irrigation and Livestock; Communications and Information Technology; Counternarcotics; Economy; Finance; Interior; Justice; Labour, Social Affairs, Martyrs and Disabled; Mines and Industries; Public Health; Public Works; Rural Rehabilitation and Development; Urban Development; Women’s Affairs. It was also to include the Independent Election Commission, the General Independent Administration for Anti-Corruption, the Office of the Mayor of Kabul Municipality, the Office of Geodesy and Cartography, the Central Statistical Office, the Office of Administrative Affairs, the Secretariat of the Council of Ministers and the Independent Administrative Reforms and Civil Service Commission.
To initiate the process, a Deputy-Ministerial Level Policy Drafting Committee established a set of working groups to define the main content of the policy, each chaired by IDLG with a co-chair from another government agency. The working groups addressed four different thematic areas: roles and responsibilities of Provinces, Districts and Villages; Municipalities; Women, Youth, Civil Society and the Private Sector; Subnational Finance and Planning. The members of these working groups were Director General-level staff of the Ministries mentioned in the Presidential Decree. In total, these groups met 16 times for a total of 26 full working days, between 15th June and 27th August of 2008. After the completion of the Working Group process, IDLG worked intensively with its partners to produce the first draft of the policy. The first draft was, finally, presented to the Policy Drafting Committee. The Policy Drafting Committee then authorized a series of consultations with members of the international community in order to further improve the policy. Working with its partners from the international community, IDLG also conducted a consultation with 802 members of provincial councils, subnational administrations and civil society.
As a result of the international consultation, subnational consultation and ongoing discussion, the policy was progressively improved over five 5 meetings of the Policy Drafting Committee, until it could be submitted to a Cabinet-level Policy Review Committee. After just two meetings of the Review Committee, a comprehensive draft of Afghanistan’s first ever subnational governance policy was submitted to the Cabinet of the Government of Afghanistan. It was reviewed twice by Cabinet, before being finally approved in May 2010.
2.2 Implementation of the SNGP
IDLG began implementation of the Subnational Governance Policy almost immediately, with notable progress in some areas, such as senior subnational appointments and reforms of subnational finance. However, as 2010 progressed, it became clear that two major recent developments would have very significant consequences for the implementation of the Subnational Governance Policy: the Kabul Process and Transition. The Kabul Process was based around an attempt to reinvigorate development efforts in Afghanistan and involved Ministries identifying priorities through a new set of National Priority Programmes, and as the process unfolded it became clear that the many activities and reforms laid out in the Policy ought to be subject to this prioritization process. Likewise, it became clear that Transition, the handover of security in the provinces from international security forces to national security forces, also required prioritization of the Policy, since several urgent subnational governance reforms were clearly needed to support security reforms. Thus, one of the first deliverables that IDLG has promised in the Local Governance NPP is a new implementation framework for the Subnational Governance Policy, one which identifies key priorities for the Government and the Transition process.
In order to prioritize the SNGP, IDLG conducted a detailed review of the implementation of the SNGP. The review provided a summary of the SNGP document, and then for each part of the policy (as stated in the summary), it showed: i) what has been done, (iii) what remains to be done, (iii) what implementation issues have been encountered, and (iv) what the overall progress level. Based on this detailed description and analysis, it presented some of the key conclusions that have emerged from implementation to date these being:
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Much of the Policy implementation is being delivered programmatically. There is a large amount of technical field work under way, such as training of Provincial Councils in roles and responsibilities and development of Municipal Financial Management Capacity, which falls under the heading of SNGP implementation. This is generally being delivered programmatically, through donor-funded programmes.
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Many major results are pending completion of the legislative reform process. In many cases, work is being deferred until new laws, such as a new Local Administration Law, can be enacted. This may generate delays of a year or more, which is a concern.
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A prioritization of the Policy has emerged from action and experience. The Policy is long and covers many topics, and IDLG has limited resources. In implementing the Policy, IDLG has focused on a few key areas such as subnational finance, subnational appointments, Public Administration Reform, PGO & DGO infrastructure and district-level councils. More recently, IDLG has formulated priorities for Local Governance Reform in the National Priority Programme for Local Governance, many of which are aligned with the Policy: the NPPLG is therefore itself a prioritization of the SNGP. Although it has not been completely formal, IDLG has in fact already prioritized the policy in more than one way.
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IDLG has backed off areas outside strict subnational governance. IDLG has not engaged in a number of aspects of the policy, for example with Local Economic Development, Anti-Corruption and Youth. These are areas which, typically, although important at the subnational level are not core subnational governance issues.
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Financial Reform has been the most successful area for inter-agency cooperation. Most of the areas of the SNGP require cooperation of other agencies to implement, and IDLG has worked very successfully with the Ministry of Finance (MoF) to date. IDLG and MoF have jointly developed a detailed set of activities to achieve the objectives of the SNGP, compromising as necessary and treating the SNGP as a set of objectives, not as a blueprint.
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A number of the objectives in the SNGP do not now seem realistic. There are some sections of the Policy, or stipulations in it, that do not seem achievable by early 2015- developing a comprehensive system of village-level administration being one.
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Security, justice and interim representative arrangements remain a challenge. The issue of district councils and village councils, and the issue of how Governors interact with security and justice institutions, does not seem closer to being solved, despite being covered in the Policy and despite the efforts of all parties to date.
Based on the analysis provided, the report than developed a set of recommendations for improving implementation in the future, which were:
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Clarify the model of subnational governance underlying the reforms that will be implemented. Through most of the SNGP, the underlying model of subnational governance is the current model, with improvements, for example clearer roles and stronger institutions for planning and accountability. In prioritizing the policy and designed detailed activities, the fact that this is the intended model should be made explicit.
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Formalize the emerging prioritization. The priorities for SNGP implementation do not need to be created from nothing: three very strong sources of guidance exist. The first is the priorities that have already emerged from work done so far. The second is the prioritization that has emerged from the NPPLG. The third is the policy priorities identified during the Transition process, which are in fact quite similar to the priorities already implicitly identified by IDLG. The formal prioritization of the SNGP should be based closely on these sources of guidance.
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Clarify roles and responsibilities without waiting for completion of the legislative process. The subnational governance institutions need more clarity about their roles and authorities now- waiting for a year or more is not feasible, especially in the context of Transition. IDLG should get agreement on the existing legal basis for subnational governance, and being work on clarifying roles and responsibilities, both through formal/administrative channels and other channels, as soon as possible.
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Get more clarity about the implementation channels for different parts of the Policy. There are a number of different channels by which parts of the Policy can be implemented- for example the legal channel and the programmatic channel. In future implementation, clarity about which channels are used is essential.
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Use the model of subnational financial reform for engaging with other agencies. The model for engagement with the Ministry of Finance can be generalized and applied to the engagement with other agencies.
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Improve Monitoring & Evaluation of Policy Implementation. IDLG should have more oversight of activities that count as SNGP implementation, at least those that fall under a newly-identified set of priorities.
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Consider new approaches for the toughest problems. IDLG and other stakeholders have been trying to solve the issues of district-level and village-level representation and the issue of Governor interaction with security and justice agencies for several years now. The easy and obvious approaches have been tried and have not been successful. New approaches are needed- for example, the issue of local councils could be addressed from a legal or Constitutional angle.
The recommendations were presented to the SNG donor group in January 2012 in a meeting co-chaired by IDLG and UNAMA, where they were endorsed. The revised implementation framework was based on these recommendations.
2.3 Prioritization of the SNGP
As recommended in the Policy Implementation Report, the approach to prioritization was to recommend an area of the Policy as a priority if it has already been prioritized either through previous action, in the NPP or as a result of the Transition process. An outline of the priorities identified through each of these areas is as follows:
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NPP Sub-Components with major SNGP linkages. By definition, all of the outcomes and deliverables of the NPP are priorities. In addition, most of the parts of the NPP relate to the SNGP in some way. In particular, a number of the sub-components specifically link to the content and objectives of the NPP, and it is particularly clear in this case that these parts of the NPP should be treated as priorities for SNGP implementation. These sub-components include: legislative reform; sub-national finance and planning; provincial and district infrastructure & equipment provision; Public Administration Reform; Provincial Strategic Planning; provincial municipal administrations refurbishment and equipment; municipal capacity development and administrative reforms; Provincial Council capacity development
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Prioritization from Action. Areas in which IDLG has been very actively engaged since the approval of the policy are equally obviously to be treated as priorities. Some of the major areas of effort on the part of IDLG that therefore emerge as priorities are: roles and responsibilities of local governance entities; subnational planning and finance; senior subnational appointments; Public Administration Reform in PGOs and DGOs; infrastructure for PGOs and DGOs; district-level and village-level representation.
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Transition Priorities. Some additional policy priorities emerged as a result of the first Transition workshop. This workshop identified a number of policy reforms that will be needed to ensure Transition. Given the importance of Transition, these should obviously be treated as priorities. The reforms mentioned related to: Public Financial Management at provincial level (for example increased provincial role in budget planning and execution); Public Administration at provincial level; strengthen the role of the Provincial Administration in the security and justice sectors; responsibilities for municipal governance; district level representation; coordination with parallel structures at provincial level.
Using these already-identified priorities as the basis for prioritization for this implementation framework ensures that the prioritization is based on experience and real needs.
To develop a single list of priorities based on the three sources above, IDLG reviewed each of the 64 points in the SNGP summary that had previously been developed. For each part, it was determined whether or not that part could be considered a priority based on the NPP, the prioritization from action or the Transition workshop. If any part was a priority according to one or more of those sources, it was recognized as a priority overall. Based on this process, 34 points of the 64 point summary were recognized as priorities for implementation. However, these could be reorganized easily into 6 overall areas, as follows:
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Priority 1- Basic functions and relationships of local entities. Functions of the Provincial Governor (PG), Functions of the District Governor (DG), Function of Provincial Line Departments (PLD) of Ministries, Function of District Offices (DOs) of Ministries (§1-7), Service delivery implementation responsibilities (§16), Role of Governor in general service delivery (§17), Role of Governor in security sector (§18), Role of Governor in justice sector (§19), Function of the Provincial Development Committee (PDC), Function of the Provincial Administrative Assembly (PAA),
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Priority 2- Institutions for planning and implementing service delivery at the local level. Identification of functions and budget for delegation (§10), Application of provincial allocation formula (§11), Announcement of provincial budget ceilings (§12), Financing of provincial plan (§14), Annual provincial planning process (§15),
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Priority 3- Increasing the organizational effectiveness of the Governors’ Office. Appointment of subnational officials (§25), Public Administration Reform at subnational level (§26), Public Financial Management at provincial and district level (§29), Infrastructure and equipment for provincial and district administrations (§30)
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Priority 4- Making provincial and district governance more accountable. , Function of Provincial Councils (§8)), Function of District Councils (§9), Role of the Provincial and District Councils (§22), Interim arrangements for district-level representation (§22)
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Priority 5- Municipal service delivery cycle. Function of the Municipality, Function of the Mayor, Function of the Municipal Council, Function of the Municipal Administrative Council, Municipality relations with other government structures (§40-§44), Scope of annual planning of service delivery by municipalities (§46), Process for annual planning of service delivery by municipalities (§47), Municipal capacity development. Municipal revenue administration, Municipal Financial management (§55-57)
(Reference numbers refer to the section of the Policy, according to the Summary developed during the review of implementation.)
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