If citizens do not know how decisions are made, how taxes are spent or who is responsible within governments, they cannot evaluate the performance of public officials. Transparency, accountability and participation are necessary conditions to ensure that public resources are used efficiently, public policies are designed in the best interest of the population and government officials act with integrity.
The ability of independent, domestic, citizen-led organizations to participate in public policy making, resource allocation, and program performance evaluation goes a long way in helping government and development agencies improve public services. We support CSOs who help foster an environment for citizens to create, execute, and oversee policies and practices that accelerate community development.

Buying and selling by public agencies offers endless opportunities for dishonest officials to make money. With large contracts the amounts skimmed off can be huge—in some cases tens of millions of dollars. PTF and its affiliates help local CSOs play a key role in uncovering and preventing the diversion of public resources by providing external oversight that complements official mechanisms to track and check the performance of the public procurement and tendering agencies.

Evidence confirms that engaging civil society in development projects can help produce improved, and better sustained, development results. PTF and its affiliates are assisting multilateral development banks (MDBs) and other development agencies with strategies to improve citizen engagement. We have produced reports and made recommendations to the World Bank and the African Development Bank (AfDB) on making civil society engagement more effective in their project, strategic and analytical work.

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