Assessment Of The Use Of Participatory Monitoring And Evaluation Approach: A Case Of Constituency Development Fund Projects In Dagoretti South Sub-County Nairobi, Kenya

Abstract

Participation development is critical towards enabling communities help themselves and fosters their efforts in their development work. While studies in participatory development have been done both at global and regional levels, most researchers have focused mainly on participation in planning, execution and management of projects. Little has been done regarding the involvement of stakeholder in monitoring and evaluation. The study assessed the use of Participatory monitoring and evaluation (PM&E) in the management of Constituency Development Fund (CDF) projects in Dagoretti South Sub-county. The specific objectives were to determine the level of stakeholders involvement in planning of the PM&E process, project identification, design and implementation, to determine the extent in which the stakeholders are involved in the selection of indicators, data collection, and analysis. Lastly to establish the extent in which stakeholders are involved in sharing and utilization of monitoring and evaluation results for the CDF projects. Quantitative and qualitative methods of collecting data were applied. The findings established that the stakeholders were not adequately involved in monitoring and evaluation of the CDF projects and their participation was very low in all the stages of the PM&E process. The documentation of activities related to stakeholders participation in monitoring and evaluation of the projects was inadequate, In addition the M&E capacity of project management committees and awareness of the community in monitoring and evaluation of CDF projects was low. Based on the findings, the study recommends that the CDF policy be reviewed to clearly capture procedures of engaging the stakeholders in all the stages of the CDF project cycle including monitoring and evaluation, and incorporate M&E staffs at the CDF Sub-County level management who can facilitate the process of monitoring and evaluation