An Assessment of the Older Citizen Monitoring Model by Helpage International in Siaya County

Abstract

Approaches that are applied by citizens or civil society organizations (CSO) to hold authorities accountable are categorised under social accountability. HelpAge International has used the older citizen monitoring approach as a social accountability approach for many years . The assessment’s key objective was to examine how the OCM model in Siaya County was implemented against the agreed standards or measured the functionality of each of the functions of the model and check if the OCM Model achieved its objective. The specific objectives were to describe the functions of the OCM Model and determine if the functions were effectively implemented, to establish if the OCM Model utilized in Siaya accomplished its objectives; and to determine factors in the environment of the model that caused the observed outcomes According to (Juppe, Ali & Baracoa 2010) there has been minimal improvements in measuring success of right based approaches like the OCM approaches. Older citizen monitoring (OCM) encompasses mobilizing and training older men and women at the basic level to track the implementation of local and national policies and services impacting their lives. The monitors agree on specific indicators and use the evidence they gather to advocate and lobby for inclusivity and structured improvements at different levels. The research design used a non-experimental approach where data was collected using a mixed method approach where both qualitative and quantitative data collection approaches. The study also interviewed key informants for verification of the findings and better understanding of the interpretations. The study found that the OCM model has a lot of potential to provide results. However, implementation of the OCM Model was not effectively delivered. It noted the concept of rights was difficult for some of the older people to understand and that information about laws and policies on older persons had not filtered down from either the government, civil society organization or the OCM groups therefore, older people were ignorant of their rights and entitlements. The awareness level on the recommended OCM process and procedures was low among the Older Citizen Monitoring Groups and the capacity of the OCM groups to conduct their mandate was wanting. Also, local government officials were willing to support the OCM model, but had yet to be involved in the implementation. Several recommendations were made to researchers studying social accountability work, organizations implementing social accountability work and to the government who are proactively encouraging citizen participation in policies and programs