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capitalize on this potentially favorable political environment to strengthen horizontal
accountability between parliament and the executive. While it is recognized that working in
this area will be challenging given parliament’s apparent lack of power to act on the results of
its scrutinizing activities, it is recommended that donors lead a detailed review of the
relationship between the two, particularly in regard to the following areas:
•
Recruitment of committee members (see internal organization and management);
•
Questioning of the executive in the chamber and/or committee rooms by
parliamentarians;
•
Committee review of policy, programs and operations, where executive witnesses can be
called, where penalties for contempt and perjury apply, and where there is an obligation
for these to be visibly dealt with in plenary;
•
Committee scrutiny of regulations and policies to ensure that all sub-ordinate regulations
are consistent with parliamentary acts; and
•
The receipt and review of audit reports.
Donors are advised to prioritize the strengthening of the Public Accounts Committee and to
support civil society groups in working with committees to provide data and disseminate
findings. In addition, donors have a key role to play in supporting financial transparency by
ensuring aid flows to the central government are made accessible to and scrutinized by
parliament.
3.
Create buy-in to parliamentary representatives in the short-term
An issue relevant to each of the sub-categories here is that there is a lack of public buy-in to the
work of parliament at both the national and local level, and this manifests in arguably negative
working relations between parliament and their constituents. Though improving levels of
public buy-in to the work of parliament was not prioritized by workshop participants, it was
deemed to be a major problem in terms of their being a lack of financial resources (see enabling
environment) to “bring development” to constituencies and therefore earn the trust and respect
of the public. With parliament facing its second democratic elections (at least to the House of
Representatives), parliament also faces problems regarding its legitimacy. While there is a
careful balance to be struck between keeping expectations of members of parliament at a
realistic level yet also ensuring that citizens do have a degree of “buy-in” to elected
representatives and parliament, it is recommended that donors consider the feasibility of the
constituency development fund model in order to provide a number of “quick wins” in the
aftermath of the 2015 election. There are a host of challenges associated with the constituency
development fund model and these need to be carefully mitigated.
4.
Improve human resourcing policies and procedures
The need to formalize the way in which Parliament recruits parliamentary staff was deemed a
needed area of reform by both workshop participants and interviewees, who cited concerns over
the recruitment of staff who lacked relevant skills or a clear job description. In line with the
view that there is a serious mismatch of actual skills to staff roles, it is recommended that
guidelines be established for the recruitment of staff members with the aim of recruiting staff
with the necessary skills to undertake the roles for which they were recruited. Importantly,
