By Bashir Hassan Abubakar
Towards effective implementation of it’s activities, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) funded activity, under the State Accountability, Transparency and Effectiveness (State2State) Activity has commenced a Two Days Grants Inception Meeting aimed at building the capacity of 12 selected organizations from Bauchi and Gombe States.
In a welcome remark shortly before the commencement of the meeting ,held on Wednesday, at Hazibal Suites Conference Hall in Bauchi, the Deputy Chief of Party (DCoP) of the Activity, Mr. John Onyeukwu said that the objective of the meeting was to introduce the organizations to the processes and expectations in implementing the State2State activities in their designated areas.
The DCoP also said that it is the first, in the series of workshops, the USAID intervention is having with the selected organizations that won the grant award to support in the implementation of the USAID funded activity in line with laid down guidelines and to also ensure compliance.
He congratulated the awardees and urged them to justify the confidence reposed in them saying, “there were over 100 applications but only 36 organizations were selected across the implementing States, after careful evaluation process.
“Though, we have been carrying out our activities in our implementing States, this is the first time we are giving awards to organizations to implement our activities, with some of the awardees implementing in local government areas”.
The DCoP, who described the awardees as partners, further expressed his hope saying, “we look forward to an impactful implementation”.
In a presentation titled ‘Citizen Engagement Strategies’ by the Citizen Engagement Director and Advisory Team Lead, Ahmed N. Mohammed, he implore the awardees to ensure that all persons are involved in either engagement or participation during implementation process of their activities.
The advisory team lead also highlighted some benefits of inclusive engagement to include: Help in supporting the development of quality policy advice, Contribute to creating a community sense of belonging and also afford decision makers to receive better advice.
Our correspondent reports that the Grants Inception Meeting attracted grant awardees from Gombe and Bauchi States, with each State having six awardee organizations to carry out activities in thematic areas that focuses on Health, Education, Conflict management, Good Governance and WASH sectors, among others. The meeting is expected to end on tomorrow ,Thursday.