Not long ago, my friend and co-founder at Connected Development (CODE), Oludotun Babayemi, exited from the Executive Management of CODE and moved to a non-executive role as member of the Board of Trustees. This means that he will no longer have day to day responsibilities or routine involvement in CODE activities, though he will continue to consult, advise and support me and the management team.

I am delighted to say that Dotun’s exit in a very remarkable way symbolizes the core spirit and value of the CODE brand and Follow The Money movement. The essence of CODE is not only captured in its written goals, mission and vision, but in an unwritten belief in the evolution of personal development.

For those readers who are not conversant with CODE, it is useful to state who we are. Founded in 2012, CODE is a non-government organization (NGO) whose mission is to empower marginalized communities in Africa. We strengthen local communities by creating platforms for dialogue, enabling informed debate, and building capacities of citizens on how to hold their government accountable through “Follow The Money”, our governance accountability and transparency initiative.

CODE provides marginalized and vulnerable communities with resources to amplify their voices with independence and integrity while providing these grassroots populations with information that engenders social and economic progress. To enhance effective democratic governance and accountability, we create platforms (mobile and web technologies) that close the feedback loop between citizens and the government. Thus, with global expertise and reach, we focus on community outreach, influencing policies, practices, and knowledge mobilization.

Our commitment to participatory capacity and community building and monitoring and evaluation creates effective and sustainable programs even within the most challenging environments.

Nevertheless, against this backdrop, we have as our fundamental drive, the hunger to evolve into a global brand that provides a platform for participatory governance, and youth development. We want to see a future where today’s CODE leadership shall be replaced tomorrow by a new cadre of civil society leaders who grew up within our ranks, and evolved into strong thought-leaders while we, the old guard, move on to higher national and global duties.

We want to see Next-Generation leaders who are well-equipped for tomorrow, trained from the emerging societal challenges of today.

This is why we recognize the importance of mentoring. I believe that for there to be a seamless transition into the next generation there needs to be a conscious mentorship agenda on the part of thoughtful leaders of today as well as a willingness on the part of today’s followers to enter what I call a “leadership conveyor belt” in order to be transported through the assembly line of Future Leader manufacture.

For instance, before Dotun left the Executive Team, he consciously planned an exit strategy which sought to “recruit and rejig” a replacement team in the CODE programme value chain.

When we started recruiting A – Team staff last year, he planned to have each new member take the pieces of his role in scaling the organization, and he provided support for their various tasks while he made his transition to work with the Board. It was when he saw the success of his transition strategy that he felt convinced that the coast was clear to make the launch up the next rung in the ladder.

For me, it was a fulfillment of the CODE dream – establishing a template for leadership evolution.

It is a situation I can relate to, having experienced a similar transition in my task in my other life at the African Youth Initiative on Climate Change (AYICC), when I moved from an Executive role as the Communications Director to a non-executive advisory role as member of the Board. Likewise, some day in the future, I will bow out as the Chief Executive of CODE to a non-executive role.

Just like Dotun is doing today, I will have the privilege of being able to step back and watch CODE develop and grow while I explore other opportunities to add value to the society and impact my world.

I believe robust and sustainable transition is the only way we can emphasize and stay committed to the ongoing success of CODE in particular, and of the wider transparency and accountability community in general. We must remain passionate about open-data, technology and citizen participation, as this is the only real doorway into the journey to deepen democracy by empowering more communities with enough knowledge to be able to hold their government accountable.

And this brings me to a very vital point. It took a long time of personal thought and research to come to the conclusion that the future of Nigeria and indeed Africa depends on active participation of civil society in the political process. A democratic state cannot be stable unless it is effective and legitimate, with the respect and support of its citizens.

Civil society is a check, a monitor, but also a vital partner in the quest for this kind of positive relationship between the democratic state and its citizens. Therefore, the best model would be when the civil society, empowered with their developmental experience and capacity, finds itself playing active role in politics.

There are reasons for this conclusion. First of all, the most basic role of civil society is to limit and control the power of the state.  For instance, as is the situation in Nigeria, when a country is emerging from decades of military rule, it needs to find ways to check, monitor, and restrain the power of political leaders and state officials.

Civil society actors serve as a watchdog, and raise public concern about any abuse of power.  They campaign for access to information, including freedom of information laws, and rules and institutions to control corruption. They promote political participation by educating people about their rights and obligations as democratic citizens, and encouraging them to critically examine electoral manifestoes and vote in elections.  They help develop citizens’ skills to work with one another to solve common problems, to debate public issues, and express their views. They play an important role in mediating and helping to resolve conflicts – by adopting bargaining, accommodation and compromise. These are all functions that guarantee a functional, sustainable state.

Secondly, civil society organizations help to develop the other values of democratic life:  tolerance, moderation, compromise, and respect for opposing points of view. And, without this deeper culture of accommodation, democracy cannot be stable. These values cannot simply be taught; they must also be experienced through practice.

So, I see a future where civil society actors-turned politicians shall help to develop programs for democratic civic education in the schools; revise the curricula, rewrite the textbooks, and retrain teachers in order to educate young people about the mistakes of the past and teach them the principles and values of democracy.

Furthermore, because they have ingrained capacity as a result of their experience, these future leaders shall strengthen democracy by providing new forms of interest and solidarity that cut across old forms of tribal, linguistic, religious, and other identity ties.  Democracy cannot be stable if people only associate with others of the same religion or identity.  They will also play the vital role of engineering electoral best practices by ensuring that the voting and vote counting is entirely free, fair, peaceful, and transparent.

Thirdly, political recruitment of today is flawed.  We need a new model to identify and train new types of leaders who have dealt with important public issues and can be recruited to run for political office at all levels and to serve in state and national legislature. To achieve this, civil society mentorship processes of today could become political recruitment platforms of tomorrow.

National Orientation Agency is a Nigerian government agency created in 2005 and tasked with communicating government policy, staying abreast of public opinion and promoting patriotism, national unity, and development of Nigerian society.

Do Nigerians have faith in NOA to build a communication bridge for citizens to interact with the government? Is citizens’ inclusion and engagement in demanding transparency and accountability encouraged? Or should we go ahead and advocate for ourselves liaising with civil societies in ensuring that our voices are heard and sideline this agency and all it stands for because of constant interferences of political bureaucracies in decision making and activities of NOA.

Am a little bit indecisive on what to think about NOA, but not entirely conclusive because of recent development by this agency to partner with civil society organisations in Nigeria. NOA gave an open call for collaboration with CSOs on the 31st of October 2017 at Ibeto Hotel, Abuja where a good number of representatives from different NGOs were in attendance.

The Director-General @GarbaAbari represented by The Director, Planning, research and strategy Dr Bonat J. Tagwai gave a brief review of NOAs five years strategy plans and their ongoing projects was made available to all participants, and full involvement of CSOs in the implementation of this program welcomed.

Some highlight of their activities includes

• A well-structured agency and adequately staffed across the country comprising of National Headquarters, 36 States Directorate, FCT 774 Local Government Offices and  3000 volunteer Corp.
• NOA has visited about 120 LGA and  communities to update them on their activities
• They have interpreted the Freedom of Information Act into 20 languages to ease understanding of the Act and drive citizen mobilization and participation in demanding accountability and transparency from their government.
• Has started a survey of 130 MDAs to engage public institutions
• And have launched NOA FM Radio 97.7 though still test running and ideas will be welcomed on how to utilize this station efficiently.

Civil Societies present participated in group work to explore opportunities for partnerships with Short presentations of each group to highlight areas of collaborations with NOA.

A Cross-Section Of CSOs During The Group work

A Cross-Section Of CSOs During The Group work

The benefit for CSOs to collaborate with NOA was further stressed that based on their staff’s strengths and 3000 volunteers scattered around the country. Ease of carrying out campaigns using this volunteer will be efficient because instead of looking for new hands or travelling to places you don’t know, NOA could provide:

The contacts of their volunteers who are always on the ground in all the state.

Location and addresses of their state offices to assist in working in new terrains.

These, in particular, will assist connected development in further driving their campaigns and growing networks.

A Cross-Section Of CSOs During The Group work

To encourage full involvement and authentic evidence of collaborations, interested Civil Societies should send official letters to the Director-General making reference of this event.

This event was viewed and broadcast on PTV News. 

Hon. Emmanuel Njoku and DG Political, Civic, Ethics and Values Dept. Mrs Ngozi Ekeoba

Connected development as started utilizing this partnership opportunity with NOA as our Program Manager for democracy and governance Hon. Emmanuel Njoku plans on working with NOA in his campaign Engaging Emerging Voters for young people below 18 years in senior secondary two and three respectively.

A little brief of the objective of the campaign by Emmanuel Njoku is to increase voter education among eligible secondary school student. The project hopes to create clubs in secondary school for sustainability across the country and provision of short training on democratic values for members

We anticipate NOA full support in achieving this campaign and ensuring that the younger generation will understand the requirement of leadership and the importance of voting to reach a better outcome in the 2019 elections.

Put seven people from the different continent in a room, and let them share experiences of how growing – up looks like in their various continent. You will get different perspectives. Ask same people, how they think their growing up could have been made smarter, I am sure they will not give you the same answer. So, do we think we have general solutions to today’s world problems? Are we living some people behind, especially in the post-cold war era? Whether it’s populism, liberalism, or extremism – it seems there is a new world order, and marginalized communities are starting to feel they have a voice, and they really want to leverage on this voice to make a certain statement!

“It is not really about liberal democracy, it is about identifying what works for your community, for your people, and what makes you tick as a nation” a resolution from a heated debate that ensued between myself, a Chinese, a Cameroonian, and an Ethiopian while passing through the border control at Frankfurt, Germany. It’s another edition of the Global Media Forum in Bonn, and I will be attending the Forum again for the second year in a row – this time to join in the discussion about Identity and Diversity. The Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum is an international congress that provides a platform for more than 2,000 media representatives, and experts from the fields of politics, culture, business, development and science.

At the end of my Junior High in 1993, Samuel Huntington published an article in the Foreign Affairs on The clash of civilizations and he reiterated his hypothesis that people’s cultural and religious identities will be the primary source of conflict in the post-Cold War world. Fast forward to 2017, the world is facing the challenge of democracy decline in developing countries, alignment between groups that find common goods amongst themselves – Qatar, Iran, Syria, China and Russia; the new revolution in France – Le Marche, which is either Left or Right; the Isolated North Korea; the British exit from the European Union; and not to forget the emergence of the blockchain technology that breaks the monopoly of powerful central banks and government agencies in maintaining single entities.

As a matter of fact, the media is not immune to this change in world order. It is becoming difficult for the media to decipher fact from lies! Cultures can decide to have their own media and share with the world, for some people – Twitter and Facebook have become their media, and as the world evolves from the 24-hour news stream, it is becoming more challenging for the media to communicate solutions. For the next three days (June 19 – 21), I look forward to engaging with delegates at the Global Media Forum to designing interdisciplinary approaches for meeting the challenges of the new world era, and explore how the media can play a central role in this post – factual time.

To follow the conversation at the 2017 Global Media Forum 2017 in Bonn, Follow The Official event Twitter handle – @DW_GMF; Official Event Hashtag #dw_gmf; and also our Twitter handle @connected_dev 

Oludotun Babayemi is the co -founder of Connected Development [CODE] popularly known for its Follow The Money Project in Nigeria, and now in other countries in Africa. You can schedule a meeting with him by commenting on this blog post, and via his Twitter handle – @dotunbabayemi

A leading NGO Connected development [CODE] has called on government at all level to take up one of its responsibilities by ensuring proper facilities are put in place in various primary health care centers in Nigeria.

Following the release of $1.5million dollars from World Bank to the 36 states respectively including the Federal Capital Territory as part of the World Bank supported “Save One million Lives” the Follow the Money team of CODE visited 6 states respectively to assess the state of the PHCs to track the implementation of these funds. These states are Akwa Ibom, Enugu, Kano, Kogi, Osun and Yobe.

Findings from the field visit to each of the states are appalling as most of the Primary Health Centres are facing several reprehensible and elementary challenges. Generically, most of them have no improved water supply, electricity, security, quarters for hospital staffers; there is no stationed doctor, and the toilet facilities are in a mess. Furthermore, because of these challenges, the PHCs do not operate 24/7, cannot admit or treat sick people and lack sufficient tables & chairs.

Some key Findings:

In Kano

Follow The money team visited Kantudu in Makoda LGA of Kano State. They found out that the PHC serves 2,500 people, all coming from 13 surrounding villages. The PHC was built 5-6 years ago as a senatorial project in Makoda LGA. The PHC has one male and female ward, which are not presently functioning. There are only three staffers with one community health worker who are not certified health professionals.

During the interactive section with the head of community Alhaji Muhammad Musa, and the community association said that they have reached out to the government of Kano twice on the state of the health centre in Kantudu, but there was no response. “We hope this campaign with ONE and CODE will make the government of Kano look at the plight of our health center so that our people can start using it” says Malam Ali, the medical head at the PHC.

In Yobe State

We were in Lantenwa, Yobe where a Primary Health Care is in a messy situation. The PHC in Lantenwa is in Lantewa village, Lantewa ward, Tarmuwa LGA. It serves a population of 13,400 under 5 yrs; 10-15 patients daily, 70-105 weekly. Speaking to the head community ,AuduLantewa, mentioned that the dispensary has been dilapidated for more than 7 years, he added that dispensary situation is critical and he personally reported the issue to local authorities several times. He further lamented that “Lantewa is the gathering centre of four neighbouring with approximately 7,000 registered voters, as such, we should get better things from the government” he said

In Kogi State

We went to the PHC to find out if the implementation of the fund is ongoing as well as to track the implementation of the N10.5 million earmarked by the National Primary Health care Development Agency for the rehabilitation of the PHC. On reaching there, there was no such intervention taking place. The Officer in Charge (OIC) said it was the first time she was hearing of such. The village head whom we paid a courtesy visit to also said he has never heard of such. We then went to the Operational Base of the NsitIbom LGA’s Health Centres and the Director of the base told us that she has never heard of such fund for the PHC’s rehabilitation

In Osun State

Our team went on ground to track the $1.5m earmarked by the World Bank and the Federal Government of Nigeria for the Saving One Million Lives Initiative and all we could see while on the field is nothing to write home about. From our findings, the facility is meant to serve 11 villages which are: Gboore, Alajue-Logun, Asunmo, Ayegbami, Agbopa, Jagun-Odomu, Olodan, Aladie, Amosun, Seesa, Akiribiti amongst others. In total, the target population which the facility is meant to serve is 12,498. 498 of the population are children less than one year, the Primary Health Care Centre has a monthly target of 42 patients, but it ends up serving more than 400 on an average.

Consequently, a Freedom of Information letters was sent to the concerned government institutions and offices for a breakdown of the funds usage, implementation window and respective contractors, especially the governmental institutions concerned, to instantaneously start the implementation of these funds, ensure transparency & accountability in the funds’ implementation, and make government data open in line with the Open Government Partnership.

Follow The Money is a growing movement currently in 32 states of the country, held community outreaches to 10 primary health facilities in Kano, Yobe, Osun, and found out that all were in a state of dysfunction, even with the funds that have been released to the states to upgrade the primary health care “Most of the Clinic at the PHC in the 5 states that our community reporters visited were in an abandoned state, lacks basic healthcare amenities and needs urgent attention to serve people at local communities.” affirmed Hamzat Lawal, CODE’s Chief Executive & Co-Founder, Follow The Money.   

He stressed that annually, over 70,000 children below age 5 in Nigeria die due to poor access to healthcare and sanitation-related illnesses (UNICEF). Lawal urged government actions to serve the people by improving better service delivery while ensuring transparency and accountability.

More pictures can be found here https://flic.kr/s/aHskNiNznP

Isn’t it nice to be back in Europe after 2 months – this time in the city of Madrid, not to see the Santiago Bernebeu, or a bull fight, but for the 4th International Open Data Conference (IODC) between October 6 – 7, 2016, the second I will be attending after the IODC in Ottawa, Canada in 2015. These IODC’s always bring back memories of the Open Knowledge Festival where you can be overwhelmed with information due to concurrent sessions taking place at the same time. The IODC in Madrid alone had 87 talks, 28-preevents, 1.660 attendees and lots of hours of shared experiences, with new networks in the kitty, and I was opportune to speak at the Indigenous Open Data Summit, a pre-event of the IODC, and also a speaker and Impact Panelist on Data + Accountability session of the IODC on the first day.

Surprisingly, the word “open washing” came out of this conference like it never had before, and I am still pondering over this like, isn’t this the same that has happened to any multi – stakeholder movement. The truth is that it has become difficult for development to persist without politics of governments. The government in this sense can now be categorised into the government of developed countries, and those of developing countries. My thoughts here are for the government of developing countries, who have not realised the potentials inherent in Open Data. They do not have to do Open Data because it is been sponsored by another government organisation, they can look inwards (if they have the right kind of eyes) and find benefits.

For instance, infrastructure dataset could be made accessible to citizens, while entrepreneurs can build tools based on the available data public use. An example could have been Doctors Office a mobile application that provides patient with a doctor to talk to, and also a healthcare locator. Although at its early stage, I asked the creator of the platform what their plans were to make this available on feature phones, so rural communities could have access as this can reduce lots of waiting time, and unacceptable death due to emergencies. Also Imagine what cmapIT can do if location dataset is made available by the government of Nigeria – Government should collaborate with this entrepreneurs, and open up these datasets while they get revenue accrued from tax – that’s what government should be doing!

Sitting on the panel on Data + Accountability with Global Witness, IDRC, Civio, Open Knowledge Germany,

Having said that, there is a renewed interest in open data by national statistics offices of countries. Talking to Mohamed Salimi, the Chief of the division of the statistics office in Rabat, Morroco made me had a sense of the direction of most statistics office and their interest in open data. Perhaps, to create more data for entrepreneurs in their countries, and largely an opportunity for them acquire knowledge on data processes. Systems that allow for capacity building is key to the open data movement, the people on the supply side must revamp the systems that operate within their organisation to allow for effective use of training within their institutions – I mean, how do you expect the culture of open data in an institution that still cannot run an organization email. As much as it is important to train government officials, it is also pertinent that we strengthen citizens knowledge on the use of data – which the school of data has started already, but a lot still needs to be done!

During the two sessions that I presented our Follow The Money work, I was asked on our relationship with the government, and how we hope to make the initiative locally owned other than some set of people determining campaigns in communities. Simply put, when we started, we were like an enemy of the government, but recently, government agencies had turned partners, but at arm’s length, with no MOU 😉 When we have contractors for government projects sending weekly situation reports to us on project implementation, then we are partners. In answer to the second question, we have community reporters leading campaigns in 29 states out of the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory of Nigeria but cannot initiate campaigns because we have not done proper orientation for them, but the idea is for them to own it. Going forward, you should look out for the next episode of Follow The Money driven by community champions themselves – how we did this, will be presented at the next IODC in Buenous Aires, Argentina. See you there!

Connected Development [CODE], a non government organization whose mission is to empower marginalized communities in partnership with Network on Police Reform in Nigeria (NOPRIN), a coalition of 49 Civil Society Organizations [CSOs] working on police reforms in Nigeria, on June 30, 2016 has lunched a real-time situation awareness platform at http://policemonitor.ng to document the human rights abuse by police on citizens and vice versa.

The Nigeria Police, as a pillar of democracy, has over the years, infringed on the human rights of Nigerians, with unlawful detention escalating everyday, and the rate of extortion of citizens becoming alarming, while all of this happens without documentation. “This is an open platform that will document several human rights abuse of the Nigeria Police on Nigerian citizen, it will be used in engaging the Nigeria Police and the judiciary to foster social justice for the citizens” said Oludotun Babayemi, the co -founder of Connected Development [CODE] during the unveiling of the platform.

The citizen driven platform will complement the Nigeria Police complaint response unit (CRU), which between January and March, was reported to have received and processed 1,054 complaints from across the 36 states and FCT, while 20 officers have been sanctioned. “We are not even sure that the CRU will survive in this new dispensation. It is hoped this new citizen – driven platform will compliment  it and remain the real citizens’ platform to report and monitor police abuses in Nigeria and to fight to ensure justice for victims and accountability by perpetrators” affirmed Okechukwu Nwagunwa, the National Coordinator of NOPRIN during the training for CSOs and the Media in Lagos,where the platform was launched.

Categories of human rights abuse that will be reported include police human rights abuse in Nigeria abuses such as arbitrary arrests,  and unlawful detention, extortion, police brutality, torture, extrajudicial killings,  and other acts of police abuse and police misconduct. Citizens can report on this platform by sending short message service [SMS] or a Whatsapp Message to 0708-000-4730

CODE is a Nigerian Non Governmental Organization, founded in 2012 to empower marginalized community by creating innovative ways of establishing feedback loops between citizens and state agents.

Network on Police Reform in Nigeria (NOPRIN Foundation) is a network of 49 civil society organisations spread across Nigeria, and committed to promoting police accountability and respect for human rights. It was established in 2000 to provide opportunity for civil society input to police reform, and the enhancement of safety, security and justice. NOPRIN carries out its mandates through monitoring, research, investigations, documentation and advocacy.

Images from the event can be downloaded at https://flic.kr/s/aHskCsHGno

For more enquiries contact the Programmes officer, Oladotun Fadeyiye at (roy@connecteddevelopment.org) or the Communications officer Amina Mohammed at (amina@connectedevelopment.org) or call us at  +234-929-1545