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Final Report

BASELINE STUDY ON UPAZILA PARISHAD GOVERNANCE

Monzur Hossain1

Badiul Alam Majumder2

Prepared by The Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS)

March 14, 2013

1 Team leader and Research Fellow, BIDS 2 Country Director, Hunger Project, Bangladesh

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ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS

A2I Access to Information ADP Annual Development Programme BASIS Bangladesh Association of Software Information Services BIDS Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies CBO Community-based Organization e-G e-governance EU European Union FGD Focus Group Discussions FYP Five Year Plan GoB Government of Bangladesh ICT Information and Communication Technology KII Key Informant Interview LD Line Department LG Local Government LGED Local Government Engineering Department LGI Local Government Institutes LGRD&C Local Government, Rural Development and Cooperative Ministry LGSP-LIC Local Government Stregthening Project-Learning and Innovation Component MDGs Millennium Development Goals MP Member of Parliament NGO Non Government Organization NILG National Institute of Local Government PPR Public Procurement Rules PSM Propensity Score Matching RTI Right to Information SC Standing Committees SRS Systematic Random Sampling UNCDF United Nations Capital Development Fund UNDP United Nations Development Programme UNO Upazila Nirbahi Officer UP Union Parishad UZC Upazila Chairman UZGP Upazila Governance Project UZP Upazila Parishad UZVC Upazila Vice Chair

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Table of Contents ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS ................................................................................... 2

_Toc351018872 ACKNOWLEDGMENT ........................................................................................................... 6 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ........................................................................................................ 8 CHAPTER 1 .......................................................................................................................... 17 Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 17 1.1 Background ............................................................................................................... 17 1.2 Objectives ................................................................................................................. 18 1.3 Scope of the study .................................................................................................... 19 1.4 Organization of the Study .......................................................................................... 19 CHAPTER 2 .......................................................................................................................... 20 2.1 Data Collection Methods ........................................................................................... 20

Sample Survey ................................................................................................................ 20 Questionnaire Design ....................................................................................................... 22

2.2 Qualitative Data Analysis .......................................................................................... 28 2.3 Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) ............................................................................ 28 2.4 Quality Control Measures .......................................................................................... 28

Data Management and Editing of Interview Schedules ........................................................ 29 Data Processing and Analysis ........................................................................................... 29 Summary of the Data Collection Framework of the Study ................................................... 31

CHAPTER 3 .......................................................................................................................... 33 UPAZILA GOVERNANCE PROJECT: AN OVERVIEW ...................................................... 33 3.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................... 33 3.2 Project Area .............................................................................................................. 34 3.3 Project Financing Facilities and Administration ......................................................... 34 3.4 The Role of UNDP and UNCDF in the Project .......................................................... 35 3.5 Profile of Project and Control Upazilas ..................................................................... 35 CHAPTER 4 .......................................................................................................................... 37 4.1 Familiarity with Secondary Legislation Instruments: Manual, Act, by-Laws .............. 37 4.2 Upazila Parishad Meetings ....................................................................................... 38 4.3 Participants of the UZP Meetings .............................................................................. 39 4.4 Decision making in the UZP Meeting ........................................................................ 40 4.5 Women in UZP Decision making .............................................................................. 40 4.6 Formation and Working of Upazila (Standing) Committees ...................................... 42 4.7 Formation of Committees and their Meetings ........................................................... 43 4.8 Women in the Committee .......................................................................................... 43 4.9 Functioning of Committees ....................................................................................... 43 4.10 Working of Transferred Departments ........................................................................ 44 4.11 Citizen Charter and Anti-corruption Strategy ............................................................ 48 4.12 Right to Information ................................................................................................... 49 4.13 Working of UZP: What Elected Representatives Think? ........................................... 50 4.14 Opinion about Existing Rules, Circulars, etc. ............................................................ 51 4.15 Women Representation in Upazila ............................................................................ 51 4.16 Other Aspects of Upazila Governance: Opinions of Elected Representatives .......... 52 4.17 Coordination between UZP (Upazila Parishad) and UP (Union Parishad) ................ 52 4.18 Opinion regarding Satisfaction on Current UZP System ........................................... 53 4.19 Problems Faced by UZP and Suggestions for Its Improvement ............................... 53 4.20 Upazila Websites and E-governance ........................................................................ 55 4.21 Summary ................................................................................................................... 55 CHAPTER 5 .......................................................................................................................... 57 5.1 Annual Budget Preparation ....................................................................................... 57 5.2 UZP Budget Preparation: FGD and KII Findings ...................................................... 59

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5.3 Peoples’ Participation in UZP Planning, Budgeting and Scheme Selection.............. 59 5.4 Budget Analysis ........................................................................................................ 59 5.5 Annual Development Plan and Five Year Plan ......................................................... 61 5.6 Planning and Project/Scheme Selection: FGD Findings ........................................... 63 5.7 Capacity building on budgeting and planning guideline ............................................ 63 5.8 Summary ................................................................................................................... 64 CHAPTER 6 .......................................................................................................................... 66 Citizen’s Perception towards Upazila parishad governance .......................................... 66 6.1 Respondents Profile .................................................................................................. 66 6.2 UZP Services and their quality .................................................................................. 67 6.3 Awareness and Satisfaction about Upazila Parishad Activities ................................ 69 6.4 Idea about Duties and Responsibilities of UZ Chair and Vice-Chairs ....................... 72 6.5 Evaluation of activities of UZP Chairman and Vice-Chairs ....................................... 74 6.6 Perception about MP’s Role in the Upazila ............................................................... 75 6.7 Awareness of Upazila Budget and Coordination between UP and UZP ................... 76 6.8 Upazila Governance .................................................................................................. 76 6.9 Expected Role of UZP in Local Development and Future Expectations ................... 78 6.10 Opinion on strengthening UZP .................................................................................. 80 6.11 Summary ................................................................................................................... 81 Strengthening of Upazila Parishad: Some Recommendations and conclusions ......... 82 REFERENCES ..................................................................................................................... 86 Appendixes .......................................................................................................................... 87 APPENDIX-II ........................................................................................................................ 88 APPENDIX-II ........................................................................................................................ 90 List of Tables Table 1: List of indicators Tracked ............................................................................................ 23 Table 2: Analytical Framework ................................................................................................. 31 Table 3: Selected UZGP Upazilas ............................................................................................. 34 Table 4: Physical infrastructure in Project and Control Area ....................................................... 36 Table 5: Availability of Secondary Legislative Instruments ........................................................ 38 Table 6: Meetings of Upazila Parishad ....................................................................................... 40 Table 7: Average Number of Council Meetings held Each Year ................................................... 42 Table 8: Information on Standing Committees ............................................................................ 46 Table 9: Availability of Citizen Charter ..................................................................................... 48 Table 10: Anti-corruption Strategy ............................................................................................ 49 Table 11: RTI Act and Its Implementation at Upazila Level ......................................................... 49 Table 12: Percentage of Male and Female Representatives in Upazilas ......................................... 51 Table 13 Women Development Forum and Budget Allocation for Women and Children ................ 52 Table 14: Annual Budget Preparation ........................................................................................ 57 Table 15: Budget Preparation .................................................................................................... 58 Table 16: Budget 2011-12 ........................................................................................................ 60 Table 17: Annual Development Plan ......................................................................................... 62 Table 18: Five Year Plan and related Information ....................................................................... 62 Table 19: Respondents Household Profile .................................................................................. 66 Table 20: Major occupation of the respondents ........................................................................... 67 Table 21: Respondents Opinion about Quality of Public Services ................................................. 67 Table 22: Evaluation of Services of Line Departments by Respondents ........................................ 68 Table 23: Satisfaction Level on Civic Facility ............................................................................ 69 Table 24: Access to UZP officials ............................................................................................. 69 Table 25: Awareness and Satisfaction on Activities of Upazila Parishad ...................................... 70 Table 26: Percentage of Respondents Who Know about Annual Development Plan of Upazila ....... 71

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Table 27: Do Citizens have any Idea About Project Selection ...................................................... 71 Table 28: Performance Evaluation by Community Respondents (KII) .......................................... 72 Table 29: Idea about duties and responsibilities of Upazila Chairman .......................................... 72 Table 30: Percentage of Respondents Who Think that Vice Chairman Accomplishes Responsibilities

Effectively ....................................................................................................................... 73 Table 31: Information on Some Selected Activities of Upazila Chairman and Vice-Chairman......... 74 Table 32: Evaluation of Activities of Upazila Chairman and Vice-Chairman ................................. 75 Table 33: Activities of local MP ................................................................................................ 75 Table 34: Satisfaction with MPs Role on Upazila’s Development Activities .................................. 76 Table 35: Knowledge about UZ Budget and Budget Session ........................................................ 76 Table 36: Citizen’s Perception towards Right to Information ....................................................... 77 Table 37: Citizen’s Perception towards Citizen Charter (CC) ....................................................... 77 Table 38: Citizen’s Perception towards Anti-corruption Strategy .................................................. 78 Table 39: Introduction of Complain Box in the UZP ................................................................... 78 Table 40: Expected Role of UZPs in Local Development ............................................................ 78 Table 41: Opinion on Strengthening UZP .................................................................................. 80 Table 42: Profile of respondents of Upazila Module .................................................................. 90 Table 43: Respondents profile under qualitative study. ................................................................ 90 Table 44: Profile of KII Respondents—Government Officials ...................................................... 91 Table 45: Distribution of Upazilas according to Formation Status of (Standing) Committees .......... 91 Table 46: Availability of UZP Officials ..................................................................................... 91 Table 47: Expected Services from UZPs .................................................................................... 92 Table 48: Functions and Role and Responsibilities of UZP, Chairs and Vice-Chairs as the Opinion of

Community Respondents. ................................................................................................. 93 Table 49 : Merits of UZP, Challenges and Suggestions ............................................................... 93 Table 50: Summary of FGD and KII findings ........................................................................... 94 List of Figures Figure 1: General Meetings held over the years ......................................................................... 38 Figure 2: Attendees at UZP meetings (Percentage), 2011-12 ....................................................... 39

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ACKNOWLEDGMENT I would like to thank the UNDP Dhaka Office for assigning the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS) responsibility of conducting the baseline study of Upazila Governance Project. The objective of this baseline study is to develop an in-depth understanding of various indicators related to newly established UZPs in the project area. I thank Mr. Md. Shah Kamal, Natioanl Project Director, UZGP for his valuable comments on survey instruments. I also thank Mr. Akram-al-Hossain, Joint Secretary, Local Government Division for his cooperation to facilitate survey works. I express my sincere thanks to Ms. Shaila Khan, Dr. Tofail Ahmed, Mr. Sydur Rahman Molla, Mr. Habebur Rahman, Mr. Zahiruddin of UNDP for their full support and cooperation to conduct the study smoothly. I thank Mr. Khabir Uddin for his tireless efforts to organize and manage field works and other administrative works at BIDS. I also thank Mr. Jamirul Islam, Abul Kalam Azad and Nazmul Hasan of Hunger Project for their efforts in organizing and analyzing qualitative data. I thank Mr. Nayanuzzaman for his research and data entry assistance. I also thank Jamirul Islam for his efforts in qualitative data analysis. I am thankful to field officers for their good work.

Finally, I express my sincere thanks to BIDS colleagues and staff for their support and cooperation.

Monzur Hossain, Ph.D. Study Director Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS)

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

1. The Upazila Governance Project (UZGP) will run for five years from 2011 to 2016 during which the pilot fiscal facility will be extended to 14 selected Upazila Parishads (UZPs) for 4 fiscal years (with 7 UZPs targeted the first year) and the main program will be expanded to the whole country. The project has been implemented by the Ministry of Local Government, Rural Development, and Co-operatives (LGRD&C) with funded by European Union and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation. The UZGP has been a part of the overall programmatic framework for UNDP and UNCDF support to the Government of Bangladesh in the areas of local Governance reforms.

2. In view of the different features of the pilot project, a baseline survey is necessary to

document critical variables related to the governance and functions of UZP and lay the benchmark for undertaking subsequent impact evaluation at the middle or end of project implementation.

3. The specific objectives of the baseline survey were to (i) collect baseline information

regarding different aspects of governance situation at the Upazila level; (ii) generate a set of benchmarks that will help monitor and measure the success of UZG project in terms of pro-poor service delivery and MDG targets; (iii) create a benchmark to assess the possible scope for and impacts of the Upazila Governance Project and (iv) assess public service delivery mechanism and community’s perception about UZPs.

4. The key component of this study is to conduct a survey to collect information on the baseline indicators on governance, development plans and budget of Upazilas as well as citizen’s perception towards governance and functions of Upazila Parishads. Two-stage random sampling procedures were applied. First, the required number of Upazilas (42) was selected from 21 districts by randomly choosing 3 districts from each of the 7 administrative divisions. At the upazila level, information was elecited from Upazila Chairman, Vice Chairs, UNO and Line Department officials. Second, a nationally representative sample of citizens from each Upazila was determined. A total of 1680 respondents—40 citizens from each of the selected 42 Upazilas, were interviewed through Systematic Random Sampling (SRS) method.

5. Qualitative surveys, such as FGDs and KIIs were conducted to complement the

findings of quantitative analysis. Views of three types of respondents were collated so that a complete picture of governance and development outcomes at the Upazila level can be highlighted. A total of 21 FGDs were conducted in selected 21 districts with UZP chairman, vice chairs, UP Chairpersons and UNOs. Two types of key informant interviews were also conducted with the line department officials and informed citizens reside at villages. A total of 118 government officials were interviewed to understand their perception towards functioning of UZP and about 179 village people (school teachers, UP members, local political leaders, businessmen etc.) were interviewed to assess their awareness and perception towards UZP activities.

6. From the survey at the upazila level, it has been revealed that regarding secondary

legislative instruments, only 6 rules out of 14 (according to Article 63(2) of the Act,

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2009) have been finalized. It is important to finalize other rules as soon as possible for better functioning of the Upazila system. It is also found that Upazila manual, budget and annual development planning guidelines, are available in almost all Upazilas. However, FGD and KII findings indicate that majority of the Upazila officials and elected representatives do not have any knowledge about the contents (rules/regulations) of these instruments.

7. RTI Act compliance has been poor in sample Upazilas as only a few Upazilas

maintain compliances properly. A specific officer for RTI compliance has not been designated yet in many of the sample Upazilas, and the information about the designated person and other provisions of RTI is difficult to obtain from UZP, as these are not posted at UZP notice board and Upazila websites in many cases.

Working of Committees 8. The picture with regard to standing committees appears quiet unsatisfactory. The

committees (standing) were formed in only 35% of project Upazilas and 75% of control Upazilas as of June 30, 2012. Control Upazilas were well ahead of project Upazilas in terms of forming committees, but not in terms of holding meetings as per rule. It is also found that Committees were formed with 6 members (on average) in all sample Upazilas, which is consistent with the Act that gives a guideline to form committees with 5-7 members.

9. Although committees are supposed to meet at least once in every two months, that is, at least 6 times in a year (According to the Act); however, during survey it has been revealed that some of the committees met only twice and most of the committees met only once in the last one year (2011-12) particularly in project Upazilas, whil meeting was not held in most of the cases in control Upazilas in the last one year although these committees were formed much earlier. This indicates that (standing) committees are not functioning properly. It has been reported during the survey that on average one to two decisions were made in the meetings; however, most of those decisions were not implemented finally. It is observed that communications and physical infrastructure development committee has been more active than other committees in terms of number of decisions and their implementation. This is expected as under ADP majority projects are related to roads and infrastructure.

10. FGD findings reveal the fact that (standing) committees do not have any role to play as the line departments are run by the decisions of other departmental committees headed by UNO and central government’s instructions. The recommendations made by committees (standing) are not even placed in UZP meetings for approval. For this reason, elected representatives largely remain ignorant of decisions of functionaries, and thus they feel aggrieved.

11. The survey findings indicate that meetings of UZP held regularly in almost all Upazilas and working paper before the meeting and minutes after the meetings were also prepared. However, it was not clear how long it takes to finalize the minutes or whether the minutes are circulated to all. It has been observed that the UNO mainly calls the meeting, while in some cases, particularly in absence of UNO, Upazila chairman does this although he is not supposed to do it. In 50% cases, a prior notice of the meeting is served a week before the meeting as per rule,while in rest of the

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cases the notice was found to be served 2-3 days or 8-10 days before the meeting. It has been reported that every participant can freely express his/her opinion in the meetings; however, from FGD findings suggest that women participants in some cases cannot express their opinion. Local MP, as an advisor to UZP, attends the meetings irregularly. However, it has been reported verbally and also revealed from FGDs and KII findings that local MP in many cases influences the decision making process of UZPs, which makes elected representatives of UZP unhappy. The influencing role of MP appears to be an obstacle to strengthening the system in the long run, as reported by elected representatives of UZPs.

Budgeting and Planning

12. Despite guidelines and instructions from the LGD to prepare annual budget, survey findings show that only about 57% of project Upazilas and 39% of control Upazilas have prepared annual budget of respective Upazilas as of June 30, 2012. Of them, majority of sample Upazilas have prepared their first budget in 2010-11. It is observed that among the Upazilas that have prepared budget, they did not follow all the standard procedures of budget preparation. Only 15% of the Upazilas were found that had arranged open budget discussions although this is an important step toward budget preparation.

13. Various reasons were mentioned for not being able to prepare the budget, for example, transfer of UNO, sickness of UZP Chairman, lack of resource and appropriate personnel, etc.

14. During the survey, respondents mentioned that MDGs have not been given priority in the preparation of Upazila budget. This is an area where UZGP could intervene. It is recommended that a specific budget wing or official is required at Upazila Parishad to prepare budget and development plan. More training and skill development programs should be undertaken to increase skills of the persons responsible for budget preparation.

15. Analysing budgets of Upazilas, it has been identified that majority of the project

Upazilas and 55% of control Upazilas have prepared surplus budget, while about 36% of project Upazilas did not show balance (surplus or deficit) of the budget, suggesting that they are incomplete. Only one control Upazila had prepared deficit budget. While, majority of project and control Upazilas showed surplus in revenue. This surplus budget triggers to the fact that UZPs are less capable of spending all revenue and development earnings.

16. Analyzing revenue income and expenditure heads of Upazilas it has been observed that the main earning comes from lease of hat/bazaar/pond/jalmahal, which constitutes about 41% of total revenue income in 2010-11 and 46% in 2011-12. The ratio is even higher among control Upazilas than project Upazilas. The next big source of revenue income in 2010-11 and 2011-12 was income from house/office rent (26%). These two sources are reported by all Upazilas. The other sources of income include 2% of land development tax (2%), tax from business entities (3%) and tender schedule sell. About 5-6 Upazilas have reported 1% of land transfer tax as about 40%

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of their revenue receipts. On the other hand, major revenue expenditure heads are honorarium of Upazila chairman and vice chairs and salary of Upazila staffs (12.5% vs 24% of total expenditure in 2011), provident fund (20% vs 4%), office and building repair (14.5% vs 8.3%), and vehicle maintenance, repair and fuel cost (9.68% vs 1.21%).

17. Revenue income has been found to be 48% of development expenditures (ADP) in

2010-11 and 46% in 2011-12. Thus, revenue-ADP ratio remained almost the same in 2010-11 and 2011-12, indicating that there is no important upward change in revenue generation in sample Upazilas.

18. Majority of project and control Upazilas’ main source of development fund is development grants (ADP) from the central government (about 90% in project and 70% (plus previous year’s balance—which may constitute about 90% or more) in control Upazilas. Other sources constitute very little of the fund. Examining development expenditures of the Upazilas, we observe that major expenditure head is the infrastructure (both physical and socio-economic heads), followed by agriculture and irrigation, education, health, and disaster and relief. Majority of the sample Upazilas did not show any expenditure on poverty reduction head (social safety net and institutional support) except a few. As Upazilas are spending on health, education, women and children development and poverty reduction, they are indirectly addressing MDGs to some extent, however, more focus should be given on it.

19. The analysis of budget suggests that there appear inconsistencies in budget heads as well as it lacks overall development perspectives of upazila. Poverty reduction and MDGs did not get due focus in the budgets, rather infrastructure overwhelmingly dominates development expenditures.

20. Almost all Upazilas claimed that they have guideline on annual plan. However, no complete and elaborated annual development plan guideline is so far available for UZP.

21. About 43% of project and 48% of control Upazilas claimed to have prepared an annual development plan. In fact, the plan is not a comprehensive development plan of the Upazila, per se; rather is a stocktaking of annual demand notes of different UPs. However, officials from almost all surveyed Upazilas mentioned that no training was provided on the planning guidelines, and that’s why it is difficult for them to prepare a comprehensive annual development plan.

22. A large number of Upazilas, both in project and control areas, do not have

comprehensive guidelines on Five Year Plan, Annual Plan and planning book.

Citizen’s Perception

23. About 60% of the respondents were found to visit UZP in different occasions and on average they visited UZP 3 times in 3 months. Most of them visit Upazila in the morning time. The respondents visit UZP and Upazila town mainly for health (40%) and land (20% vs 25%) purposes. Other purposes of visit included local conflict (about 10%), fisheries and livestock (5%), education (5%) and family planning (5%)

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purposes. A good number of people visit upazila town for banking services (about 12-15%).

24. Findings show that around 70% of respondents are aware of day-to-day administrative role of the chairman, while more than 75% of respondents think that preventing crime and resolution of local conflicts are important duties of the chairman. About 50% respondents mentioned that monitoring activities of vice chairmen is one of the duties of UZ chairperson. Most of the respondents are not aware of other duties of the chairman and vice chairs as stipulated in the Upazila Manual. About one-fourth of the respondents do not know what are the activities of Chairman and Vice-chairmen, so they are unable to evaluate their activities.

25. Citizen’s perception towards the role of UZP in local development is somewhat ambiguous. The main role of UZP, according to citizen, is development of roads/infrastructure, followed by provide services such as health and education, agriculture and irrigation, electricity, etc.

26. Respondents were asked to evaluate the quality of services of line departments at the

Upazila level in a 5-point scale. Most of the respondents graded the quality of services provided by line departments at the upazila level as very poor (bad). There is no difference in terms of grading in both project and control Upazilas. The quality of communication and infrastructure and agriculture and irrigation services were rated as bad in both areas. The services of law and order, primary and mass education, secondary and madrasa education and health and family welfare departments were graded as relatively better than other departments.

27. It is found that awareness about upazila activities varies across types of activities. For

example, while majority of the respondents are aware of activities related to public service delivery, they are not quite aware of some manadated activities like preparation of annual budget and various development plans.

28. Respondents’ were asked to evaluate the activities of their respective Upazila’s Chairman, vice chairman and woman vice chair and Upazila Nirbahi Officer. On a 5-point scale, the average rank is estimated to be 3 for all the three, indicating that their performance is at the average level. Community leaders (KII) also rated their satisfaction on elected chairmen and vice chairs as average. The ranking does not vary across project and control upazilas. However, about 50% of the respondents did not participate in evaluation of activities of UZ chair, Vice chairs and UNO.

29. It has been revealed that to bring more accountability and transparency in Upazila Parishad activities and strengthen democracy, some awareness building measures for citizens about the Upazila’s activities could be undertaken under the UZG Program.

30. Regarding MPs role, only 18% of the respondents gave their opinion, while majority of the respondents either didn’t know or made no comments about the role of local MP—the reason perhaps is that the issue is politically sensitive. Only the development activity of MP that is visible to citizens is the construction or repair of roads (78% mentioned of it). Other activities, as mentioned by a small proportion of respondents include develop education institutions, coordination of projects, provide relief etc. While about 45% of the respondents did not make any assessment on the

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role of MP, 25% of the respondents mentioned that they are not satisfied and the same proportion said that they are less satisfied. Only a few (3%) said that they are highly satisfied with MPs role in development activities at the Upazila level.

31. Almost all of the respondents are not aware of Upazila budget and budget session of Upazila. They are also not aware of Upazila by-laws. About 20% of the respondents mentioned that the working relationship between UNO and UZP chairman is good, while about 70% of the respondents are not aware of it. Similarly, only about 10% of the respondents mentioned that coordination between Upazila and Union Parishad is good, while about 20% of the respondents think that it is so so. However, more than 60% don’t have any knowledge the situation.

32. Regarding RTI compliance, Citizen Charter and anti-corruption strategies of UZP, most of the citizens were found to be unaware of them.

33. Citizen’s perception about the expected role of UZP in local development was saught.

The main role, according to the survey, is the development of roads/infrastructure (40.6% vs. 44%), followed by health and education (11% vs. 13.4%), agriculture and irrigation (8.5% vs. 5.6%), and electricity (7.4% vs. 6.5%). Another notable role mentioned by the respondents was to organize opinion sharing meeting (6.5% vs. 8%). Respondents also expect these types of services from UZP in the future.

34. In order to strengthen the UZP, the most stated opinion from citizen was to contain corruption and bribery (26%) in order to strengthen UZP. Other important suggestions include more administrative power to UZP, more budgetary allocation for UZP and participatory decision making through consultation with the people. Moreover, electing honest and capable people in UZP is another way way of strengthening UZP.

Concluding Remarks and Recommendations:

35. After 4 years of election in UZP, the Parishad has not been functioning as expected. Election in reserved seats has not been held yet. Parishad meetings are held regularly, though UZ chairs often complain that local MP influences major decisions. Standing committees meet sporadically without having strong control on decision making processes of respective line departments. These are the areas of concern for making UZP a vibrant and democratic LG unit.

36. Activating Committees (standing) properly is central to linking local level governance

with local level development outcomes. An effective Committee (standing) can ensure accountability and transparency in public service delivery of line departments, which in other way is expected to enhance pro-poor and MDG targeted development outcomes of Upazilas.

37. As departments are still running by the decisions of their own committees, it is therefore important to delineate relationship between standing Committees and other departmental committees. Disbanding of departmentmental committees or bringing them under direct supervision of (standing) committees could be one way to make the (standing) committees effective.

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38. Making a five year development plan properly will have significant bearing in rejuvenating developmental activities at the Upazila level. In the future course of time, local level five year plans and annual budgets based on such Plan can be integrated with national five year plan and national budget, which will make local government decentralization process more meaningful as well as lead to more inclusive development.

39. To make the Parishad meetings more purposeful and to reduce undue influence in

decision making process from different quarters, under the Upazila Act 1998, Article 28, a mechanism for greater mandatory institutional interaction can be devised between local governments (Upazila Parishad) and CBOs/ NGOs available locally, with their role as observer, to ensure the transparency in local projects selection, increased efforts to revenue mobilization, support local level needs, and improve monitoring.

40. Another potential area of intervention in improving local governance is to ensure e-

governance at the Upazila level, as mandated in Upazila Act 2011 (Amendment). Updated Upazila’s websites and use of ICTs in Upazila activities could open up the avenue of ensuring e-governance. Ensuring e-governance will allow transparency and voice to the citizens as well as make the administration more accountable with lower costs of transaction.

41. Some specific policy and operational recommendations to strengthen Upazila system

(short-to-medium-to long term) are suggested below: • Upazilas must be transformed in line with article 59 of our constitution by ensuring the rule of

people’s representatives at all administrative units. All the functionaries at the Upazila level should be brought under the direct supervision of Upazila Parishad.

• The government has so far finalized 6 rules on functioning of Upazilas out of 14 (According to Article 63(2) of the Act, 2009 (amended). This slow pace of finalizing other rules greatly hampers better functioning of Upazila Parishad. Therefore, it is recommended to finalize the rest of the rules as soon as possible for the sake of better functioning of Upazila Parishad.

• MPs’ developmental role is unconstitutional. Thus, their role should not go beyond the current advisory role to UZP

• Development role of Upazila should focus more on MDGs, rather than only on infrastructure development

• Efforts should be made for effective transfer of departments by disbanding parallel bodies such as departmental committees, or bring those departmental committees under the direct supervision of (standing) committees

• Expenditures and revenues of line departments should be integrated to Upazila budget • Capacity building should continue in different areas. It is necessary to build capacity of

elected representatives by making them aware of laws, rules and guidelines etc. For day to day functioning, it is necessary to provide representatives with hands-on training to hold meetings, write minutes and working papers. Moreover, capacity building for technical work, such as budget preparation, plan preparation, e-governance will be necessary

• Capacity building of M&E and MIS section of LGD is important in order to maintain an effective and sustainable monitoring and evaluation system of local government. Necessary technical and skillful personnel must be appointed there to revitalize the system.

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• A national framework for local government capacity development can be developed, which will be instrumental for local government development.

• Local government offices at the divisional and district level should be equipped with a sustainable system of monitoring and backstopping local governments.

• As a long term objectives, policies should be undertaken in such a way that UZP can be made autonomous without the control of respective ministry/ministries.

KEY INDICATORS Indicators Project

Upazilas (ref: as of

June 2012)

Control Upazilas (ref: as of June 2012)

Total

Outcome No. of available effective secondary legislation instruments required by UZP Act 2011 6 6 6

No. of UZPs that have adopted internal rules and by-laws (Prabidhan) including an anticorruption strategy and a Citizens’ Charter

0 0 0

Percentage of citizens aware of the roles and responsibilities of UZP (average) 33.2 32.55 32.7

Percentage of citizens satisfied with services specifically targeted by Upazilas through pro-poor and MDG responsive planning (average)

12.9 15.15 14.4

% of UZPs that have disclosed annual plan and budget according to rules and regulation (as of June 30, 2012)

42.86

39.28

41.00

No. of UZP that have election in reserved seat 0 0 0 Output 1 Percentage of male and female UZP members who

report they can participate effectively in debate and influence decision making

27.3 42.3 37.48

% of UZPs that are compliant with at least 90% of the provisions of the Right to Information Act 35.71 21.43 26.19

% of Upazilas having all 17 (standing) committees functioning -Formed (as of June 30, 2012) -Average no. of bi-monthly meetings held

0

34.6 1

0

74.8 0

0

60.42 1

% of Upazilas having registered Women Development Forum

46.5 39.29 41.46

Number of women’s development forums registered at the District level

6 3 4

% of UZPs that have prepared a “Citizen’s Charter” incorporating arrangements for UZPs

85.7

92.85 90.47

% of UZP which are holding at least 8 (council) meetings a year

100 100 100

% of UZPs which have formed all (standing) committee as per UZP Act (as of June 2012)

34.6 93 60.42

% of UZP which (standing) committees are holding at least two meetings in a year

42.85 10.7 21.4

% of UZPs that include line department budgets in their plans and budgets

0 0 0

16

Indicators Project Upazilas (ref: as of

June 2012)

Control Upazilas (ref: as of June 2012)

Total

% of members (councilors) who report that they can participate effectively in debate

57.10 60.0 55.5

% of women councilors in all UZPs who report they can participate effectively in debate

49.4 36.36 42.86

% of women councilors in all UZP who report they can influence decision making

24.37 22.63 23.50

Output 2 Number of integrated line department activities in UZP plans and budget

0 0 0

No. of Upazilas that have prepared a 5 year plan 0 3 3No. of participating UZP that have produced development plans responding to local MDG and identifying needs and actions related to the most vulnerable groups (such as the Dalits or other locally relevant excluded groups)

0 0 0

Percentage of performance based grants allocated to projects identified as MDG-responsive in annual development plans in the final year of project.

0 0 0

% of Upazilas where councilors/members and officials trained in use of Upazila Development Planning and Budgeting Guidelines per year

16.7 24.0 21.62

% of UZPs that largely follow the Upazila Development Planning and Budgeting Guidelines

50.0 39.29 42.86

Output 3 Number of legislative or regulatory instruments which are existing now

6

Existence of a National Framework for Local Government Capacity Development

No

Existence of functioning M&E and MIS system in the Monitoring, Investigation and Evaluation Wing of LGD

No (although there exists an M&E and MIS section, it lacks proper capacity to handle issues)

Number of DLGs who have a sustainable system for monitoring and backstopping local governments

0

No. of District Local Governments with a functioning system for monitoring and backstopping local governments

0

17

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background

The Upazila system, a middle tier local government unit between Union Parishad and Zila Parishad, was introduced in 1982 through the Local Government Ordinance 1982 (Upazila Parishad and Upazila Administration Reorganization). The Upazila Parishad Ordinance (1982) was particularly significant as this was supposed to help implementation of the decentralization program of the government. In the Upazila System, the elected Chairman had the principal authority in running the affairs of the Upazila, his/her tenure being five years. The Upazila Nirbahi Officer would be subservient to the Chairman. However, after nine years of reasonably effective implementation, the system was abolished in 1991. After 20 years, Upazila election was held again in 2009 following the Upazila Act 1998 and subsequent amendments in 2009. Due to some apprehensions among the elected representatives on the role of local MP and UNO in Upazila Parishad, the Act was again amended in 2011, which has created possibilities to make the Upazila an effective and vibrant local government (LG) unit. Being a middle tier of LG unit, Upazila has greater importance in the political and administrative context. In particular, an effective Upazila Parishad (UZP) can contribute substantially to make local administration accountable to democratically elected institutions and enhance rural development. Important public service departments including health, education, water and sanitation, agriculture etc. have been transferred to UZP as per rule. Bringing all this functionaries under the umbrella of UZP could make public service delivery mechanism more efficient and accountable for which a strong democratic and well-governed UZP is needed. Until now, a total of 17 Line Departments have been transferred to UZP. With a revitalized shape and structure after the amendments of the Upazila Act, the UZP has significant bearing on the local level development. The redefined role of the UZP includes, among others, local level development planning (both annual and five year) and budgeting, inclusive development by giving more emphasis on MDGs by shifting focus from only on infrastructure-led development, making functionaries more effective and pro-poor service oriented etc. The new leadership at the Upazila level therefore needs greater experience and exposure in managing this tier of LG that combines civil bureaucracy, development professionals, and other public leaders within one single institutional framework. Most of the newly elected leadership of the UZP also needs greater skills to promote pro-poor public service delivery in the face of competing demands from various social and political interest groups. The participation and democracy within the Parishad and the skills to promote peoples' participation in the functioning of UZP are critical elements of the local leadership's skills requirement. Without the immediate provision of such skills the UZP may not be able to perform with its full potential and meet people’s expectations. To support the Government of Bangladesh in achieving the expected results from the Upazila system, a donor-driven program, namely the Upazila Parishad Governance Project (UZGP) has been initiated in 14 Upazilas on a pilot basis for the period 2011-2016 with an aim to provide performance-linked fiscal facilities. The project is expected to contribute to making Upazilas an important local government unit in promoting local democracy and ensuring efficient delivery of basic pro-poor social services. It is therefore necessary to conduct a

18

baseline study on various indicators of the project to assess pre-project conditions and track those in subsequent impact assessment. A recent BIDS study (2011) on the assessment of supplementary block grants provided to LGSP-LIC Union Parishads shows a positive impact of devolved block grant funding on infrastructure and service delivery at the local level as well as performance improvement of UPs in areas such as planning, finance, resource mobilization and management. It has been revealed in the study that the UP, lowest tier of local government, faces many difficulties to deliver appropriate development needs at the local level without proper coordination from the Upazila level, the middle tier of local government. For example, construction or reconstruction of roads, culverts and other infrastructures that connect two UPs in most cases remain stalled if both the UPs do not agree to do it at the same time. Thus, to solve development problems at the local level, the Upazila could turn into a more holistic and integrated local governance framework, in which UPs, the line agencies and the Upazila Parishads complement each other. To make the fiscal transfers more effective and MDG-oriented, there is no alternative to strengthen the UZP by improving its governance, democratic environment within the Parishad and making the elected representatives more skilful. In this context, the Upazila Governnace Project (UZGP) has started in 14 selected UPZs in 2011 on a pilot basis with performance-linked fiscal facilities. Within the project framework, conditional fiscal transfers will be made to the selected UPZs to:

• strengthen mechanisms of mutual accountability; • reinforce GoB policies on citizen engagement (citizen charter, RTI, e-governance); • make the UZP as a coordinator of development planning; • mainstreaming gender issues; • promote pro-poor and gender sensitive planning and services; • promote livelihood supportive environment; and • enhance oversight, monitoring and policy review functions.

The UZGP is expected to run for five years from 2011 to 2016 during which the pilot fiscal facility will be extended to at least 14 UZPs for 4 fiscal years (with 7 UZPs targeted the first year) and the main program will be expanded to the whole country. The project will be implemented by the Ministry of Local Government, Rural Development and Co-operatives (LGRD&C) with funded by European Union and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation. The UZGP has been a part of the overall programmatic framework for UNDP and UNCDF support to the Government of Bangladesh in local governance reforms.

1.2 Objectives

In view of different features of the pilot project (UZGP), a baseline survey is essential to document critical variables related to the present phenomena and lay the benchmark for undertaking impact evaluation at the end of project implementation and needs to be carried out immediately before starting the pilot project in full swing. Therefore, this study aims to assess the pre-project (UZGP) conditions at the Upazila level, which may help policy makers to take necessary actions in strengthening the UZP in fulfilling its mandate.

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The overall objective of the baseline survey is to assess the pre-project governance and development conditions in the project UPZs with a comparison to control UPZs. The specific objectives of the baseline survey are to:

• collect baseline information regarding different aspects of governance situation at the Upazila level;

• generate a set of benchmarks that will help monitor and measure the success of UZG project in terms of pro-poor service delivery and MDG targets;

• create a benchmark to assess the possible scope for and impacts of the Upazila Governance Project;

• public service delivery mechanism; and • community’s perception about UZPs.

1.3 Scope of the study

The baseline study is expected to develop baseline information regarding different aspects of governance situation at the Upazila level in both project and control Upazilas. The benchmark information will help assess the possible scope for and impacts of the Upazila Governance Project (UZGP). A set of variables/indicators are identified on which information has to be collected. In particular, the study has the scope of identifying various aspects of Upazila Parishad. The scope includes:

• Citizen’s/community perception towards UZP decision making, planning and budgeting as it can create positive impact on accountability;

• UZP’s spending ability in terms of yearly expenditure pattern; • UZP’s trends in revenue mobilization (own-source revenue vs. others); • Dispute resolution mechanism on development projects; • Various line departments/agencies activities and service delivery situation; • Working environment between public representatives and administration • Standing committees and their activities; • Anti-corruption strategies adopted by UZPs; • Budgeting and Development Planning in line with MDGs; and • Women participation in UZP activities.

1.4 Organization of the Study

The Report is divided into 8 Chapters. After Introduction, Chapter 2 discusses detailed methodologies applied in the study. Chapter 3 is about the Upazila Governance Project. Chapter 4 assesses various governance aspects at the Upazila level while, Chapter 5 analyzes budgeting and development Planning of Upazilas. Chapter 6 analyzes citizen’s perception towards Upazila Parishad and its governance. Chapter 7 makes a qualitative assessment of the Upazila governance and finally, Chapter 8 concludes with recommendations on strengthening Upazila Parishad.

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CHAPTER 2 METHODOLOGY The key component of this study is to conduct a baseline survey of indicators on upazila governance, development plans, and budget of Upazilas as well as citizen’s perception towards governance and functions of Upazila Parishads. For this purpose, a representative sample of Upazila Parishads as well as citizens of the selected Upazilas has been selected using standard statistical techniques. This Chapter discusses the sampling procedures as well as other analytical approaches employed in this study.

2.1 Data Collection Methods

Sample Survey There were two concerns in this study. First, select a nationally representative sample of Upazila’s to collect information on governance issues, and second, select a representative sample of citizens from the selected Upazila’s, to assess their perception towards Upazila governance situation and public service delivery mechanisms. Therefore, two-stage random sampling procedures were employed. First Stage: Upazila Selection The required number of Upazilas was determined from each of the 7 administrative divisions using the following sample size determination formula:

Nupz = Z2[P(1-P)/d2] *deff Here Z is a standard normal variate, which is assumed to be 1.96 at 5% level of significance. P is one of the parameters to be measured, for example, percentage of Upazilas that prepare five-year plan, which is assumed to be 1.5% (P=0.015). d indicates the level of precision at 10% (d=.10). The design effect, deff is considered to be 1 as the selection of Upazila is straightforward. The estimated Nupz = 5.68 ≅ 6, that is, around 6 Upazilas need to be selected randomly from each Division. Thus, a total of 42 Upazilas were selected out of which, 28 Upazilas were selected randomly (control Upazilas) and the rest 14 were UZGP Upazilas (project Upazilas). The Upazilas were selected in a representative way as follows: No. of Division 7 No. of Districts 21 (3 from each Division) No. of Upazilas 42 (2 from each of the selected districts)

Second Stage: Respondent Selection At this stage, a nationally representative sample of citizens from each Upazila to be surveyed was determined using the following statistical formula:

21

Nc = Z2[P(1-P)/d2] *deff Here Nc represents the number of citizens interviewed and deff represents design effect. For household survey, deff is usually considered to be between 1.5 and 2. Here we assume it to be 1.5 and consider Z=1.64 at 10% level of significance and precision d=0.1 at 10% level. We consider P=10% as it can be assumed that around 10% citizen may visit Upazila, who can be the potential respondents. Therefore, the required number of citizens was Nc = 36.30 from each Upazila. Thus, about 40 citizens from each of the selected 42 Upazilas were interviewed. Finally, a total of 1,680 respondents were interviewed. The distribution of sample Upazilas is shown in Error! Reference source not found.Table 1.

Table 1: List of sample Upazilas Divisions Project Districts Control District Dhaka Kishoreganj Jamalpur, Shariatpur Chittagong Brahmanbaria Comilla, Cox's Bazar Rajshahi Sirajgonj Natore, Pabna Khulna Khulna Magura, Satkhira Barisal Barguna Barisal, Bhola Rangpur Rangpur Dinajpur, Panchagarh Sylhet Sunamganj Habiganj, Maulvibazar The detailed list of randomly selected Upazilas is given in the Appendix A2. Citizens were selected in three stages of random sampling as follows: The enumerator first made a census survey on the number of households in the selected village. Then the interval of household (k) was estimated as, K = N/n where N is population (total number of households in the village) and n is the sample size. Household heads were interviewed. However, in absence of the household head, his wife or elder son/daughter, who is 20 years or older was interviewed. To maintain gender balance, the proportion of women respondents is about one-third of the total respondents. As this is a systematic random sampling (SRS), a household after k households was then selected for interview. In this way, a total of 20 respondents from a village were selected for interview.

2 unions were selected randomly from each

Upazila

2 Villages were selected randomly from each of the Union

20 households were selected randomly (systematic) from each of the villages

22

Questionnaire Design The questionnaire of the survey was developed through a number of processes. First, the literature and the existing profile of the project have been examined and reviewed. Second, a reconnaissance survey was conducted to get a first-hand idea of the project and site condition. Based on the review and reconnaissance survey, a set of comprehensive questionnaires was prepared by the consultants of the BIDS in order to facilitate the data collection from the field. The questionnaire was then reviewed by the representatives of UNDP, LGRD and Cooperatives Ministry and BIDS researchers to assess its suitability and validity in line with the objectives of the study. Third, a pre-testing of the questionnaire was done in order to ascertain the time length of interview, suitability of questions and sequential flow of it. After analysis of the pre-test result, the questionnaire was modified and finalized for data collection from the primary sources. Personal interview approach has also been used for collection of primary data. This method relates to the collection of data directly from the head of the households as well as UZP officials. The field investigators personally contacted the respondents and obtained desired information by explaining the objectives of the study to them. Some data, especially those relating to socio-economic conditions, demography, housing characteristics, etc., were collected through observational approach as far as possible. Two modules of questionnaire were developed:

1. Upazila Module consists of questions to collect information on Upazila governance indicators. Structured and semi-structured questions are incorporated to collect information. Information on this questionnaire was collected by interviewing mainly Upazila Chairman, UNO, office super/clerk, as well as by analyzing financial documents of Upazilas.

2. Citizen Perception Module consists of structured and semi-structured questions on their perception towards Upazila and its governance aspects.

The questionnaires were furnished with questions covering indicators mentioned the Table 2.

Table 2: List of indicators Tracked List of variables/ indicators Comments/Questions to be asked

Outcome: i. No. of available effective secondary legislation instruments required by UZP Act 2011

a. From Upazila Act (amended) 2009 and various circulars of LGD.

ii. No. of UZPs that have adopted internal rules and by-laws (Prabidhan) including an anticorruption strategy and a Citizens’ Charter

This indicator has three components and thus it should be determined combining results on all three issues.

iii. Percentage of citizens aware of the roles and responsibilities of UZP

This indicator in its current form is not directly measurable because the percentage of awareness of citizens might vary across different roles and responsibilities. However, by taking an average (percentage) of all roles and responsibilities, it might give a combined (rough) indicator.

iv. Percentage of citizens satisfied with services specifically targeted by Upazilas through pro-poor and MDG responsive planning

This indicator in its current form is not directly measurable because the satisfaction level might vary across different services. However, by taking an average (percentage) of all roles and responsibilities, it might give a combined (rough) indicator.

v. No. of UZPs that have disclosed annual plan and budget according to rules and regulation

This indicator has two components—annual plan and budget. Thus it should be determined combining results on these issues

vi. No. of UZPs that have election in reserved seat

Straightforward

Output 1:

i. Percentage of male and female UPZ councilors who report they can participate effectively in debate and influence decision making

The indicator has been measured as follows: a. Effectiveness: effective participation has been measured by taking proportion of

issues raised over the issues discussed in the meeting. b. Influence decision making:This has been measured by taking proportion of issues

raised over the issues accepted in the meeting

ii. Number of UZPs that are compliant with at least 90% of the provisions of the Right to Information Act

The indicator should be based on the following aspects of RTI Act: a. Whether person/official for providing information is designated and available. b. Whether the applicants are getting their desired information within the time

stipulated in RTI act. c. Whether the responsible person has informed the applicants within ten days in

24

List of variables/ indicators Comments/Questions to be asked

case of failure to provide the requested information. d. Whether the name, address, designation, phone and email address and other

particulars of the responsible for providing information have been sent to the information commission within 15 days of his/her appointment/assigned.

iii. Average number of key standing committees functioning in UZPs

Functioning of committees should be measured combining information on all the following issues:

a. How many standing committees have been formed till now? b. How many members (size) are there in each of the standing committee? c. Whether the meetings of each committee hold every two months. d. Whether the minutes of the meetings are sent to the local MP in the stipulated time

as per the act.

iv. Number of women’s development for a

registered at the District level

This information may be collected from Upazila “Women and Children affairs” department as well as from the female Vice chairs. However, creating women development forum is not a mandataed activities of UZP.

v. Number of UZPs that have prepared a “Citizen’s Charter” incorporating arrangements for UZPs

Information on the following three would be necessary: a. Has the Citizen’s Charter been prepared? b. Whether it is publicly visible. c. Whether the contents of the charter are delineated properly.

vi. % of UZPs that are holding at least 8 (council) UZP meeting a year

Starightforward (minutes of the meetings may be collected)

vii. % of UZPs that have formed all standing committee as per UZP Act


viii. % of UZP that standing committees are holding at least two meetings in a year


25


ix. % of UZPs that include line department budgets in their plans and budgets

Review of Upazila Budget would be helpful

x. Whether Upazila planning book is available.

Collecting a copy of the Plan book might be helpful

xi. a. % of members in UZPs who report that they can participate effectively in debate b. % of women councilors in all UZPs who report they can participate effectively in debate c. % of councilors in all UZPs who report they can influence decision making d. % of women councilors in all UZPs who report they can influence decision making

Influencing decision making cannot be measured straightforward way. Therefore, various alternative information, such as how many issues they have raised, how many of their raised issues have been incorporated in the agenda for implementation, will be required. Effectiveness = No of issues raised/No. of issues discussed Influence decision making = No of issues raised/No. of issues accepted

Output2 i. Number of line department activities integrated with UZP plans and budget

The following information might be helpful: a. % of budgetary allocation of Upazila development plan. b. Break down of expenditure of Upazila parishad fund.

ii. Number of Upazila that have five year plan

a. Whether the Upazila has prepared the five year plan b. If yes, collect copy of at least the table of contents and some other important pages of the plan book.

iii. Number of participating UZP that have produced development plans responding to local MDG and identifying needs and actions related to the most vulnerable groups (such as the Dalits or other locally relevant excluded groups):

The following information may complement the required indicator: a. Whether the Upazila parishad has any list or database of the vulnerable groups (Dalits, beggars, women-headed poor households, disable, climate victims/refugee, river erosion victims, etc.) in the area of the Upazila. b. Whether the Upazila parishad has identified and prepared any list of the special needs of the above mentioned vulnerable groups. c. Whether the (relevant) standing committees’ members are aware and informed about the MDGs (What is MDGs, how many, priority, etc.). d. Is there any list of development activities related to any MDGs in the Upazila

26


development plan book?

iv. Number of participating UZPs with development plans that have at least one development intervention addressing needs of the identified most vulnerable groups (such as the Dalits or other locally excluded groups)

a. Whether at least one development intervention is mentioned in the development plan and implemented/ implementing actually exclusively for the above mentioned vulnerable group. b. Is there any exclusive plan or program for the above mentioned vulnerable group? (if yes, please collect the evidence paper)

v. Percentage of performance based grants allocated to projects identified as MDG-responsive in annual development plans in final year of project:

a. Analysis of budgetary allocation of the last three years to assess the MDGs –responsive performance based grants.

vi. % of Upazila members and officials trained in Upazila Development Planning and Budgeting.

Combined information on the following may fulfil the purpose: a. Whether members received any training b. What type of training received by whom? c. Who were the resource persons? d. Where the training was held?

vii. % of 484 UZPs that largely follow the Upazila Development Planning and Budgeting Guidelines.

Combined information on the following budgeting guidelines would be required to measure this indicator: -Whether draft budget was circulated to local MP, UPs, Press club -Whether draft budget was published in the website -Whether arranged an open discussion on the budget -whether it was approved after incorporating all the comments received

viii. % of UZPs that have be-laws (Prabidhan)

Straightforward

Output 3 i. Number of legislative or regulatory instruments which are existing now (Tick the following which are existing):

From Upazila Act 2009 (amended) and various LGD circulars

ii. Existence of a National Framework for Local Government Capacity Development

a. Is there any documents regarding this? Need to consult with LGD officials.

27


iii. Existence of functioning M&E and MIS system in the Monitoring, Investigation and Evaluation Wing of LGD (capturing key data on local government performance):

Consult secondary documents and respective LGD officials

iv. Number of DLGs who have a sustainable system for monitoring and backstopping local governments

This should be based on secondary documents available in LGD.

iv. No. of District Local Governments with a functioning system for monitoring and backstopping local governments

Secondary information from LGD

2.2 Qualitative Data Analysis

2.3 Focus Group Discussions (FGDs)

One FGD was conducted in one of the two selected UZPs from a District with participants including Upazila parishad officials, UZP chairman, Vice Chairman/person and other members. In total, 21 FGDs were conducted in 21 selected districts. Key Informant Interviews (KIIs) The key informants were those who are aware of Upazila services and organizational structure. In this context, two types of interviews were done—one with line department officials and the other with informed citizens of Upazilas. Three KIIs with Line Department Officials and 4 KIIs with informed citizens were conducted in each of the Upazilas. A total of 294 KIIs were conducted.

2.4 Quality Control Measures

A two-day extensive training program was organized for the preliminarily selected enumerators on the use of questionnaire, and, a field-testing was also done in one Upazila (Dhamrai Upazila). A total of 25 enumerators attended the training sessions. Five supervisors were selected based on their good performance in the training session. Consultants and project manager of the project made extensive visits to survey sites in order to monitor data collection process as well as to get an impression on various aspects of the Project. The data collection procedures were supervised continuously by the researchers. The members of the consultant team monitored the interviews as well as provided specific feedback to the enumerators regarding the interview as and when required (e.g., rapport establishment, questioning style, use of probing questions and approach to the respondents). As a follow-up to cross check the field data collection, supervisors re-interviewed some of the sample respondents for checking the process followed by the data enumerators. The supervisor of the enumerators checked all completed interview schedules on a daily basis to identify the missing information, ambiguous answers, numerical errors, and provided feedback to the enumerators. Besides, the consultants made them accessible for clarifying any issue coming up from questionnaire administration over mobile phones.

29

Field Operation Management Tree

Study Director/Team Leader leads the whole team in right direction for smooth operation of the whole assignment and also contributes to the analysis and compiling of the report. Consultant provides advisory services and expertise inputs, as well as contributes qualitative analysis and writing report (partially). Project Manager coordinates the field operation, administration and management. Field Supervisors ensure the quality of data at field level, spot check, and back check of data collection. Field Officers/Enumerators collect data from respondents and check the responses repeatedly. Data Management and Editing of Interview Schedules The data management activities included registration of the interview schedules, editing of interview schedules, data entry, and cleaning, processing and analysis. Each interview schedule was edited before entry into the computer. Editing of interview schedules was undertaken to ensure that the interview schedules were accurately and completely filled in by the field investigators and responses are consistent. Data Processing and Analysis Data entry format has been designed by using MsAccess software and subsequently editing was done by SPSS Software. After trial of the format, the data entry has been done by

Consultant

Field Supervisor

Study Director / Team Leader

Project Manager

Field Supervisor Field Supervisor Field Supervisor Field Supervisor

Field Officers / Enumerators (4)





30

experienced data entry operators using the data entry format developed in consultation with the Statistician and System and Data Management Specialist. All the collected data were processed and analysed in accordance with the objectives of the study. Editing, rechecking, coding and tabulation were done during processing of data. Consistency checks and keystroke errors were also detected and corrected accordingly before data analysis.

Summary of the Data Collection Framework of the Study

Table 3: Analytical Framework Research Tools

Types of Respondent

Number of Respondents Methods/ Process of respondent selection

Key Research Questions/ Findings

House Hold Survey

Adult household head/other member

A total of 1,680 respondents. They were selected from 42 Upazilas of 21 Districts—3 districts from each of the seven divisions of the country. At the Upazila level, two unions from each Upazila were selected randomly and then one village from each union was selected randomly. Then 20 respondents from each village were selected for interview through SRS method.

Systematic Random Sampling Method (SRS)

• % of citizens aware of the roles and responsibilities of UZP • % of citizens satisfied with services specifically targeted by Upazilas through pro-poor and MDG-responsive planning • How frequently do they visit the Upazila parishad • Whether the concerned line department officers remain available in their office and official residence. • Expectation from Upazila parishad and recommendations to improve the quality of services provided from Upazila parishad. • Many other questions regarding demand and supply side of the services of Upazila parishad.

Key Informant Interview

Local elites, social gate keepers/watch dogs, community leaders and influential persons

Two Key Informants (KI) from each sample village. A total of 168 KIs from 84 sample villages were interviewed. In addition to that, three KIs from LDs of each 42 sample Upazilas were interviewed. A total of 126 line department officers were interviewed as KIs.

purposively • Whether active participation in development planning

• Whether active participation in budgeting system. • Whether the 17 standing committees have been

formed • How many members (size) are there in each of the

standing committee (5-7)? • Duration of the committees (how many months ?) • Who are the presidents of the committees?

FGD Upazila 6-8 persons for each FGD purposively • Date, time and place of the meetings.

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Research Tools

Types of Respondent

Number of Respondents Methods/ Process of respondent selection

Key Research Questions/ Findings

chairman, vice chairman, UNO, Pourashava mayor and UP chairman

• List of participants of the meetings • Minutes of the meetings • List of activities mentioned in the Upazila planning

book. • Whether the concerned line department

representatives are included in the relevant standing committees

• Break down of the budget allocation in the Upazila development plan

• Whether the upazila has prepared the five year plan • Is there any guidelines /book in up- a zila parishad

on development plan and preparing budget?

Institutional Info

UNOs, Line deparment officers , Upazila chairman and vice chairman

Relevant government officials at Upazila level

• Whether the UZP manual available or not. • Whether the UP operational manual available or

not. • Whether the RTI act available or not • Whether the budgeting guidelines available or not • Whether the UPB available or not • Whether the tendering guidelines available or not • Whether the procurement guidelines available or

not • Has the Citizen’s Charter been prepared? • Whether the UZP has any by-laws

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CHAPTER 3

UPAZILA GOVERNANCE PROJECT: AN OVERVIEW

3.1 Introduction

The Upazila Parishad Governance Project (UZGP) has been implementing in 7 districts of 7 divisions on a pilot basis in order to make the Upazila Parishad (UZP) an active and vibrant Local Government (LG) unit bringing all service providers at Upazila level through creating a mechanism of participatory, democratic and accountable body corporate as envisioned in the Local Government (UZP) ACT 1998, which was amended in 2009 and 2011. The UZGP is part of the overall programmatic framework for UNDP and UNCDF support to the Government of Bangladesh Local Governance reforms, funded by the European Union, the Governments of Switzerland (SDC) and Denmark (Danida). The UZGP has been initiated with four overarching broader objectives as was mentioned in the project document. First, it will support the Government of Bangladesh to implement the governance reforms at Upazila (UZP) level that include the recently (re) established elected council at the middle tier of LG Unit. Second, it will support the UZP to fulfill its development mandate for service delivery and leverage its comparative advantage in delivering development and services at the local level and accelerating the achievement of the MDGs recognizing locally specific needs. Third, it will weave the UZP into a more holistic and integrated local governance framework in which the UPs, the line agencies and the Upazila Parishads complement one another, co-financing local development programs that are locally accountable. Finally, it will support central government's capacity to monitor these local governance reforms and to develop a National Framework for Local Government Policy and Capacity Building for local government institutions (LGls) and local level functionaries. In line with the broader objectives, the UZGP will focus on the following specific objectives:

• To use a wide range of participatory mechanism and methods to strengthen the functioning of the Upazila Parishads.

• To develop an effective local level planning and visionary service delivery system by

bringing all the government, non-government and private sector initiatives under a coordinated and integrated local level planning and management framework.

• To introduce a pilot fiscal facility for the Upazila Parishad. These funds will enable

the newly established councils to program activities co-financed with the Union Parishads and the line agencies at the local level, thus providing glue that brings together currently disparate resources under local accountability, and enabling the UZP to further its development mandate with a particular focus on MDG acceleration.

• To promote the financing of MDG related activities under the UZP plan framework.

As already mentioned, the UZGP will run for five years from 2011 to 2016 during which the pilot fiscal facility will be extended to at least 14 UZPs for 4 fiscal years (with 7 UZPs targeted the first year) and the main program will be expanded to the whole country. The

34

project will be implemented by the Ministry of Local Government, Rural Development and Co-operatives and will be funded by European Union and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.

3.2 Project Area

As already mentioned, the project covers 7 Districts representing one in each of the 7 Divisions in order to pilot equity initiatives in a priority pro-poor setting measured in terms of i) being the most off-track on the MDG targets and ii) to which UZP managed local public service delivery contributes significantly. The 7 Districts were selected according to the following criteria:

• Representative sample of poverty levels of Bangladesh (proportion of population below the upper poverty line)

• Inclusion of 3 former LGSP-LiC districts (including Sirajganj District) The selected districts and Upazilas are shown in Table 3.

Table 4: Selected UZGP Upazilas SN. Division Selected District Selected Upazila 01. Dhaka Kishoreganj Kishoreganj Sadar, Mithamain 02. Chittagong Brahmanbaria Brahmanbaria Sadar, Bancharampur 03. Sylhet Sunamganj Jagannathpur, Sullah 04. Rajshahi Sirajganj Kazipur, Ullapara 05. Khulna Khulna Dumuria, Dacope 06. Barisal Barguna Betagi, Barguna Sadar 07. Rangpur Rangpur Pirgonj, Pirgachha

3.3 Project Financing Facilities and Administration

Within the 7 districts, the Fiscal Facility of the UZGP will cover 14 UZPs comprising 2 UZPs in each selected district in each of the 7 Divisions. A phased approach will be adopted: year 1-2 work in 7 UZPs (1 in each of the 7 districts), Year 3: 2 UZPs in each district, and then rising to 14 (2 in each of the 7 districts) in fourth years.

BOX: UZGP FINANCING Programme Duration: 5 years Anticipated start/end dates: August 2011 - July 2016 Management Arrangement: National Implementation

35

Administrative Agent: UNDP Total estimated budget*: $19,312,916 Out of which: 1. Funded Budget: $ 18,058,889

1. Unfunded budget: $1,254,027 ( Total estimated budget includes both program costs and indirect support costs)

Sources of funded budget ($): • Government 935,828 (Equivalent to 700.00 lakh BDT)** • UNDP 2,000,000 • UNCDF 1,000,000 • European Union* 10,138,889 • SDC* 4,920,000

*Contributions are provided in EUR and CHF ** 1 BDT is equal to 74.80 USD as on 01/08/2011 and subject to exchange rate variations Source: Project Document While the immediate focus is on the 14 UZPs that receive the pilot Fiscal Facility, all the remaining UZPs of the country will receive a basic level of capacity building support on demand delivered through the DDLG, lGs and their district facilitation teams. The program will run with the LGD offices of Director, Deputy Director, and LG unit of the Divisional Commissioners' offices. Additionally, much of the program funded training, including aspects of the peer-to-peer horizontal learning, will be delivered to all, or a significantly larger group of UZPs and UPs than those targeted directly for fiscal support by the program.

3.4 The Role of UNDP and UNCDF in the Project

UNDP takes the lead in supporting the Government for the implementation of the UZGP project. UNDP supported activities are related to the promotion of democracy, the development of a framework for local Government Policy and Capacity Development, women empowerment, and local planning. UNCDF will also provide technical support as required. UNCDF, given its specific capital investment mandate, will ensure the delivery to Government of fiscal grant transfers to Local Government Institutions (e.g. UZPs). UNCDF will also take lead and responsibility on fiscal decentralization aspects related to performance based grant systems, UZGP budgeting, UZGP own revenue mobilization, public financial management, local investment programming, local procurement and policy promotion related to these areas.

3.5 Profile of Project and Control Upazilas

Basic profile of the project and control (selected) Upazilas is shown in Table 5. No systematic difference in physical infrastructures and other facilities is seen between project and control areas. It is observed that literacy rate is slightly higher in UZGP Upazilas than the control Upazilas. The number of projects is also higher in UZGP Upazilas compared to other

36

Upazilas. Road infrastructures are better in control Upazilas. Education and health facilities are comparable between project and control Upazilas.

Table 5: Physical infrastructure in Project and Control Area Project

(UZGP) Upazila

Control Upazila Total

Upazila profile Area (sq km) 361.87 391.21 381.31Population in 2010 269345.10 249988.70 256440 Literacy rate 48.38 43.35 45 No. of Union Parishads (average) in each Upazila 10 10 10 % of UZP having Pouroshovas 57 64 62 No. of current projects (average in 2012) 47 43 44 Road infrastructures Pucca roads (km) 122.66 150.68 141.34 Semi pucca roads (km) 125.18 31.99 63.94 Kutcha roads (km) 483.32 528.46 513.42 Health facilities in each UZP (on average) Number of health centres 12 14 13 Number of hospitals 1 1 1 Number of hospital beds 83 39 53 Number of charity hospitals 10 32 25 Number of doctors 16 12 13 Number of compounders 4 4 4 Number of mid-wives 12 11 11 Number of nurses 14 8 10 Education facilities in each UZP (on average) Number of primary schools 154 128 136 Number of high schools 38 34 35 Number of madrasas 26 30 29 Number of colleges 10 8 9 Transport facilities Number of baby taxi 73 134 113 Number of rickshaws 1250 1276 1268 Number of vans 265 485 397 Number of auto bikes 195 66 105 Number of Nosimon or korimon 138 565 429 Number of Tempoos 51 66 63 Number of bus terminals 2 2 2 Others Number of slaughtering centres 3 8 7 Number of community centres 20 29 26 Mosques /Temples/Churches 386 435 419 Number of business entities 984 923 953 Number of business entities with TIN number 60 115 90 Natural Resources Land area (in acre) 91747.76 74304.56 80260 Number of ponds 2035 3456 2946 Number of beels 42 37 39 Number of rivers 2 3 3

37

CHAPTER 4 UPAZILA PARISHAD ACTIVITIES AND GOVERNANCE ASPECTS: AN

ASSESSMENT

This chapter analyses various aspects of functioning of Upazila Parishad, its governance structure and other related indicators. Information was collected from both project and control UZPs so that a comparison can be made. As there is no one-stop service delivery mechanism at the UZPs, the information were collected from various sources including Upazila Chairman (66%), Upazila Vice Chairman (55%), Upazila Woman Vice Chair (64%), Upazila Nirbahi Officer (81%), Line department officials (67%), Office Assistant/Head Clerk (40%) as and when appropriate. As for evidence, various documents such as copy of budget, minutes of the meetings, agenda of the meetings, etc. were also collected. One of the limitations of this survey is that there is no specific person available in UZP who can answer all the relevant questions. The most knowledgeable person about the UZP is the UNO, who even during the interview time, in many cases, was not available in the office or busy otherwise. It also happens that exaggerated information was given to show good performance of a respective Upazila as fiscal resources (e.g., ADP) were made contingent upon better performance of Upazila through some LGD circulars. However, to tackle non-response and biasness in information, we verified some of the information by browsing Upazila websites and making phone calls directly to respective UNOs, and, overall, we take a triangulation approach of analysis by combining FGD, KII and survey results.

In addition to quantitative survey, the study also undertook qualitative survey, which included 21 Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) in 21 Upazilas and 297 Key Informant Interviews (KII) covering all 7 divisions of Bangladesh. Respondents of the FGD included UZP chairs and vice chairs (male and female), UP chairmen, mayor of municipality and UNO. Five to eight persons participated in each FGD. Key informants include line department officials and informed citizens such as teachers, businessmen, local political leaders, UP members, etc. Findings of qualitative surveys are discussed simultaneously with quantitative analysis in order to draw a complete scenario of Upazila Parishad and its overall governance.

4.1 Familiarity with Secondary Legislation Instruments: Manual, Act, by-Laws

According to Article 63 (2), only 6 rules (গ-ঙ, ছ, ঞ, ত) out of 14 have been so far finalized by the government. The rest of the rules have not yet been prepared/finalized, for which many of the functions and activities of Upazilas are hampered. It is thus important to frame the rest of the rules as soon as possible for the sake of better functioning of Upazila parishad. UZP manual, UZP Act 1998 and (Amended) 2011, UP operational manual and budgeting guideline are found to be available in all projects and control Upazilas. RTI Act and Tender guideline are also available in all sample Upazilas except a few control Upazilas. Although majority of the sample Upazilas do have secondary legislative instruments, most of the concerned officials and elected representatives of UZPs are not aware of the contents (rules and regulations) of these instruments. In FGDs, 48% of respondents affirmed that they

38

have not read the manual, rules and laws about UZP. Rest of the respondents told that they had read the documents. Some Upazila chairmen (UZC) mentioned that they have read all the documents but not attentively. In most cases, UP chairmen, who are also members of UZP, told that they did not get the manual, rules and the by-laws. Hence, they could not read those; even in some cases UZVCs also did not get official notice/letter/circulars, etc. in time. The FGD findings and quantitative analysis suggest that UZP officials and elected representatives need proper training on these legislative instruments for proper functioning of UZP.

Table 6: Availability of Secondary Legislative Instruments Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) UZP Manual 100.00 100.00 100.00 UP Operational Manual 92.86 100.00 97.62 Budget guideline 92.86 100.00 97.62 RTI Act 100.00 92.86 95.24 Tender guideline 100.00 96.43 97.62 Procurement guideline 92.86 100.00 97.62 N (No. of Upazila) 14 28 42

4.2 Upazila Parishad Meetings

4.2.1 Arranging the Meeting

The survey results indicate that monthly meetings of UZP were held regularly in all Upazilas and working papers before the meetings and minutes after the meetings were also prepared (Table 7). It can be observed that the UNO mainly calls the meeting as mandated, while in some cases Upazila chairman did this for various reasons although s/he was not supposed to do so. In 50% cases, a notice of the meeting was served a week before the meeting as per rule. However, note that a large proportion of Upazila officials including public representatives (60-70%) were not given any training on how to conduct a meeting (Table 7).

Figure 4.1: General Meetings Held over the Years

9

9.5

10

10.5

11

11.5

12

12.5

2009‐10 2010‐11 2011‐12

Project Control

FGD findings also support the findings of the survey. It has been learnt from FGDs that the UZPs have arranged meetings more or less on a regular basis. On average, 85% of UZPs have

39

met at least once a month over the last one year, and the rest met on bi-monthly basis. This has happened because of absence of UZC; however, this is not an usual practice.

The respondents of FGDs reported that UNO office generally prepares the notice in consultation with UZC, including agenda along with working paper and then serves it to all members of UZP after certain days—one week or in some cases 2/3 days before the meeting date. After the meeting, the minutes of the meeting are prepared and served them to all—but it takes time to finalize the minutes of the meeting. However, some of the FGD participants complained that they did not get minutes and even they did not know what decisions were made in the meetings. These concerns, therefore, need to be addressed in order to make UZP meetings more meaningful and purposeful.

4.3 Participants of the UZP Meetings

Survey results indicate that the Upazila chairmen attend more than 80% of the meetings. The percentage of attendance of other members in meetings is somewhat lower than the UZ chairman, as is shown in Figure 4.2: UNO (64% vs 71%), UP chairman (71% vs 46%), line Department Officials (43%), and local MP (0 vs 18%)3. It is reported that participants can express their opinion freely in the meeting. Local MP, as an advisor to UZP, attends the meetings irregularly. However, it has been reported verbally that local MP in many cases influences the decision making process over phone even without attending the meetings (Table 7).

Figure 1: Attendees at UZP meetings (Percentage), 2011-12

The survey findings are consistent with FGD findings. Most of the FGD discussants told that most of the members including officials of almost all departments of UZP attend the UZP meeting whenever they are held. A few respondents told that the representatives from Upazila line departments do not attend regularly. About 58% of FGD respondents reported that local MP or his/her representatives attend meetings of their UZP, albeit irregularly, and take active

3 The percentages in parentheses stand for project and control Upazilas, respectively.

85.71

64.2971.43

42.86

0

82.1471.43

46.43 42.86

17.86

UZ Ch

airm

an and

Vice chairm

an UNO

UP Ch

airm

en

Line

Dep

artm

ent

Officials

Local M

P

Project Control

40

part in its proceedings4. They often dominate the discussion and heavily influence the decision making process. It is also found that MPs in 24% (the proportion is 33% in the survey) of UZPs have never attended in any of the UZP meetings. In some cases, MP does not attend meeting regularly, but on request of him/her, the UZP had to arrange special meeting where s/he attends.

In addition, in some cases, as representatives of civil society, NGO service holders, advocates, head teachers of school, principal of college, members of market committees, etc. attend the UZP meeting, as non-voting members whenever invited.

It is also reported in FGDs that all participants of the meeting have to sign in the meeting attendance register. Some UZPs maintain separate attendance register for the members of civil society.

4.4 Decision making in the UZP Meeting

FGD findings suggest that all elected representatives and officials of Upazila departments, who attend the meeting, remain active in the discussion. In most cases, decisions in the meeting are taken by giving priority to local need with the consent of all members. It is also reported that in most of the UZP meetings they did not use voting system for decision making.

It is mentioned that if MP or his/her representatives attend the meeting, then they seriously influence the decision making process. Sometimes UNO or UZC or UNO and UZC jointly dominate the discussion and manipulate the decision making process. Elected UZP representatives appear to be very unhappy with this role of local MP. The decision making process at the Upazila level thus should not be influenced/interfered by MP. This kind of practices creates obstacle to make the local government unit more democratic and functional.

4.5 Women in UZP Decision making

Women do not have adequate representation in UZP as election of women reserved seats have not been held yet. As a result, the only women representative in each UZP is the female vice chairperson (UZPVC-Female). In addition, a few more women, particularly line department officials, were found to attend the UZP meetings. About 50% of FGD respondents reported that women participation in discussion is good. They can place their opinion freely in the meeting. Their proposals are also accepted but rate varies in a wide range, such as from 20% to 90%. A few FGDs stated that women’s opinions do not get priority in the meeting. Even nobody wants to hear attentively their proposal. Most of their proposals are rejected in the meeting because of their lack of knowledge and articulation of the subject matter.

Table 7: Meetings of Upazila Parishad Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Is meeting of UZP held regularly? Yes 100.00 100.00 100.00 No 0 0 0 Whether working papers are prepared properly before the meeting

0 0 0

4 According to UZP Act, there is no provision to allow the representatives of MPs in the UZP meetings.

41

Whether minutes of the meeting were prepared? Yes 100.00 100.00 100.00 No 0 0 0 Who calls UZP meeting? UZ Chairman 57.14 50.00 52.38 UNO 85.71 89.29 88.10 UZ Vice Chairman -- -- -- Women Vice Chairman -- --- -- Local MP -- -- -- How many days before the meeting a notice of the meeting is usually being served? 0-6 21.43 32.14 28.57 7 57.14 53.57 54.76 8-10 21.43 14.29 16.67 Who attended the meeting UZ Chairman and Vice chairman 85.71 82.14 83.33 UNO 64.29 71.43 69.05 UP Chairmen 71.43 46.43 54.76 Line Department Officials 42.86 42.86 42.86 Local MP (attended regularly) 9.09 7.69 8.11 Local MP (attend irregularly) 63.64 50.00 54.05 Any training given on how to conduct a meeting of UZP? Yes 27.27 41.67 37.14 No 72.73 58.33 62.86 N 14 28 42 Table 8: Status of participation in the meeting

A. Project

No. Of meetings attended last year (1)

Whether participated in the meeting freely (% of Yes) (2)

How many issues raised in the last meeting (3)

How many of them were discussed (4)

How many issues were finally accepted (5)

Effect-iveness of participation (6)=(4)/(3)

Influence decision making (7)= (5)/(3)

N

Female members (Female vice chair)

7 90 3 1 1 33.33 33.33 10

Male members

5 8.33 4 3 2 75.0 66.67 12

All members

12 45.45 7 4 3 57.1 42.9 22

B. Control

No. Of meetings attended last year

Whether participated in the meeting

How many issues raised

How many of them were

How many issues were


Influence decision making (7)=

N

42

(1) freely (% of Yes) (2)

in the last meeting (3)

discussed (4)

finally accepted (5)

(4)/(5)

Female members

5 81.82 5 2 1 40.0 20.0 22

Male members

6 6.25 5 4 2 80.0 40.0 16

All members

11 47.3 10 6 3 60.0 30.0 38

C. Total

No. Of meetings attended last year (1)

Whether participated in the meeting freely (% of Yes) (2)

How many issues raised in the last meeting (3)

How many of them were discussed (4)

How many issues were finally accepted (5)


Influence decision making (7)= (4)/(5)

N

Female members

6 84.38 4 2 1 50.0 25.0 32

Male members

6 7.14 5 3 2 66.67 40.0 28

All members

12 48.33 9 5 3 55.55 33.33 60

Table 9: Average Number of Council Meetings held Each Year Project Upazilas Control Upazilas

2009-10 (# UZ)

2010-11 (# UZ)

2011-12 (# UZ)

2009-10 (# UZ)

2010-11 (# UZ)

2011-12 (# UZ)

Total Number of meetings -General meetings -Emergency meetings

14 (13) 12(13)

2 (5)

14(13) 12(13)

2(5)

13 (13) 12(13)

1(5)

13 (27) 11(20)

2(15)

14(27) 12(20) 2(15)

12(27) 10(20) 2(15)

Coordination meetings 9 (4) 10(4) 9(4) 10(13) 10(13) 10(13)

4.6 Formation and Working of Upazila (Standing) Committees5

Upazila Committees have important bearing on making UZP more effective and efficient in delivering public services. According to Upazila Act (amended) 2011, 17 Committees have to be formed with UZ vice chairs (UZVC) as the chairperson of the committee. This section discusses various aspects of Upazila committees, such as their formation, holding meetings, decision making process, etc.

5 In the Upazila Act 2011 (Amendment), “Standing Committee” was renamed as only “Committee”.

43

4.7 Formation of Committees and their Meetings

Table 10 reports detailed information on 17 (standing) committees. Survey findings show that committees were formed in 35% of project Upazilas and 75% of control Upazilas as of June 30, 2012. While control Upazilas were well ahead of project Upazilas in terms of forming committees, project Upazilas performed better in conducting meetings. According to UZP Act, 2011 (Amended) Committees must be constituted with 5-7 members. Our survey results indicate that Committees were formed with 6 members (on average) in all sample Upazilas, which is consistent with the Act.6 Committees are supposed to meet at least once in every two months, that is, at least 6 times in a year (According to the Act). However, findings suggest that some of the committees met twice and most of the committees met only once in the last one year (2011-12), particularly in project Upazilas. In control Upazilas, meetings of most of the committees were not even held in the last year, although these committees were formed much earlier. In terms of holding meetings, project Upazilas’ performance is relatively better than control Upazilas. It is reported in project Upazilas that one to two decisions on average were made in the meetings; however, 50-70% of those decisions were implemented finally. It is observed that Communications and physical infrastructure development committee is more active than other committees in terms of number of decisions and their implementation. This is expected as under ADP majority projects are related to roads and infrastructure.

4.8 Women in the Committee

It is observed that in 90% cases, the chairperson of two Committees, namely “Women and Children Affairs” and “Social Welfare,” was women. Women also lead some other Committees in few Upazilas. However, law and order, physical structure, agriculture and irrigation, and education related committees are mainly headed by the vice chairman (male). Among the committee members, the proportion of female members is less than 15%. Relevant officers of line departments act as the member secretary of the committee (Table 10).

4.9 Functioning of Committees

Most of the respondents participated in FGDs said that the committees could not play due role in carrying out the programs of UZP. According to opinions of the respondents of FGDs, the lack of initiatives from government departments to make the committees effective has been reflected by not implementing the decisions of the committees properly. There have been apprehensions among the elected representatives that committees meet just to abide by the government rules—they do not have any role to play as the departments run by the decisions of own departmental committees. Although it would be ideal to place recommendations of the Committee to UZP for considerations, it does not happen in reality. So, elected representatives remain largely ignored in the decision making process of functionaries. On the other hand, line department officials (as KII respondents) affirmed that every department has one or more other committees in addition to the (standing) committee in order to take and implement decisions on departmental development activities, which are generally

6 According to Act, the committee should consist of 5-7 members.

44

headed by UNO. They mentioned that decisions taken by departmental committee get priority than those of the (standing) committee. Transferred departments are still functioning as they were in the past. One Upazila (Jogonathpur) was found where all activities of its transferred departments are carried out by the recommendations of the respective (standing) committees, and thereby, other committees have become gradually inactive there.

4.10 Working of Transferred Departments

It has been observed from FGDs that the transferred departments in general, mostly work through their own departmental committees. Therefore, elected representatives of UZP do not know how the decisions on various issues of line departments are made. A large portion of the FGD respondents (elected representatives in UZP) expressed their dissatisfaction about the availability of line department officers in the office during office time. They report that most of the officials of transferred departments are available in their office regularly in the morning, but they are not usually found in the office in the afternoon. Most of them leave Upazila before the weekend. According to FGD respondents, the effectiveness of UZP largely depends on good coordination between UZP and transferred departments. About 48% of respondents of FGDs expressed that the coordination between UZP and the government officials is good, 41% respondents termed it not good and the rest 11% had no comments. Moreover, they mentioned that there are various reasons for the lack of coordination between elected representatives and line department officers, including interference of MP, not having enough power regarding disciplinary action, not following the decisions of UZP, etc. They also expressed that the government should take initiative to improve the working relation between UZP and officials of transferred departments. Only then transfer of departments to the UZP will be meaningful and effective.

Line Department Officials (through KIIs) also expressed some of their concerns regarding working of these departments under UZP as follows.

• Political interference might increase • Misuse of power might happen • The rules will not be followed • Unfair favor to party people will increase • Political interference will reduce work speed • Conflict between UNO and UZC can undermine the work performance • Decision making process might be prolonged • Activities will control by Chairman and his/her muscle-men • Corruptions will be increased • Create conflicts between officers of line department and UZC for getting undue privilege • Conflicts between departmental committee and (standing) committee will undermine the

working environment • Nepotism may increase

It seems from the opinions of line department officials on transferred departments that while they see a clear improvement of public service delivery through increasing accountability and transparency, they are also worried about political interference that might increase corruption in line department activities. Thus, improvement of governance through more checks and balances in UZP activities would be required. Increasing citizens’ awareness and more people’s participation in UZP activities could be one of the solutions to reduce corruption and political interference as well as it may increase the probability of quality leaders being

45

elected/re-elected. At the same time it has also been revealed that local level officials have conservative mindset/ego of working under democratically elected local level representatives, which is not consistent with our constitutional mandate.

46

Table 10: Information on Standing Committees Name of committees % of Upazilas that have formed

Committees as of June 30, 2012

Average no. of meetings held in the last year (2011-12)*

Average no. of decisions made during 2011-12*

Project Control Total Project Control Total Project Control Total 1 Law and Order 35.71 72.0 58.97 2 1 1 2 1 1 2 Communication and Physical Infrast.

Development 35.71 73.08 60.0

2 11

7 13

3 Agriculture and Irrigation 35.71 76.92 62.5 2 0 1 3 0 1 4 Secondary and Madrasa Education 35.71 76.92 62.5 2 0 1 2 0 1 5 Primary and Mass Education 35.71 75.0 60.53 1 0 0 1 0 0 6 Health and Family Planning 35.71 76.0 61.54 1 0 0 2 0 1 7 Youth and Sports Development 35.71 73.08 58.97 1 0 0 1 0 0 8 Women and Children Development 35.71 76.92 62.5 1 0 0 1 0 0 9 Social Welfare 35.71 73.08 60.0 2 0 1 1 0 0 10 Freedom Fighter 35.71 75.0 60.53 2 0 1 2 0 1 11 Fisheries and Livestock 35.71 76.0 61.54 2 0 1 1 0 0 12 Rural Development and Cooperatives 35.71 76.0 61.54 1 0 0 1 0 0 13 Culture 35.71 76.0 61.54 1 0 0 2 0 1 14 Environment and Forest 35.71 73.08 60.0 1 0 0 2 0 1 15 Market Price Observation, Monitoring

and Control 35.71 75.0 60.53

1 00

20 1

16 Finance, Budget, Planning and Local Resource Mobilization

35.71 76.0 61.541 0

0 2

0 1

17 Public Health, Sanitation and Pure Water Supply

28.57 76.0 57.141 0

0 1

0 0

Total (average) 34.60 74.82 60.42 1 0 1 2 0 1

47

Table 10 (contd..) % of decisions implemented

or in the process of implementation*

Gender of the Chair of Committees (%)

No. of Members of the Comm.

Proportion of female members

Project Control Total Project Control Total Project

Control Total Project Control Total

1 Law and Order 65 31 43 87.5 12.5 37.5 4 8 7 6.5 5.4 5.8 2 Communication and Physical

Infrast. Development 90 938 87.5 12.5 37.5

6 66

5.3 19.815.0

3 Agriculture and Irrigation 75 0 25 83.87 16.13 38.7 6 6 6 5.3 2.9 3.7 4 Secondary and Madrasa

Education 530 17 70.97 29.03 43.0

6 55

7.9 11.610.4

5 Primary and Mass Education 63 0 19 70.0 30.0 43.3 6 6 6 9.2 11.8 10.9 6 Health and Family Planning 53 0 17 32.26 67.74 55.9 6 6 6 11.8 11.5 11.6 7 Youth and Sports Development 25 0 10 37.5 62.5 54.2 6 6 6 5.7 8.6 7.6 8 Women and Children

Development 600 19 6.25 93.75 64.6

6 55

17.7 25.122.6

9 Social Welfare 56 0 19 9.68 90.32 63.4 6 6 6 20.0 16.2 17.5 10 Freedom Fighter 45 0 14 46.43 53.57 51.2 6 5 5 14.3 35.0 28.1 11 Fisheries and Livestock 50 0 17 36.67 63.33 54.4 4 6 5 19.2 13.2 15.2 12 Rural Development and

Cooperatives 500 17 25.81 74.19 58.1

6 66

15.7 11.312.8

13 Culture 62 0 19 43.33 56.67 52.2 6 5 5 11.8 13.3 12.8 14 Environment and Forest 55 0 18 51.61 48.39 49.5 5 5 5 7.1 10.7 9.5 15 Market Price Observation,

Monitoring and Control 690 20 66.67 33.33 44.4

5 66

6.9 5.25.8

16 Finance, Budget, Planning and Local Resource Mobilization 62

0 19 75.86 24.14 41.46 6

64.3 4.1

4.2

17 Public Health, Sanitation and Pure Water Supply 50

0 17 37.93 62.07 54.06 5

513.1 11.0

11.7

Total 57.82 2.35 20.47 51.17 48.83 49.61 6 6 6 10.69 12.75 12.06 *Less than 1 meeting on average is considered as 0 meeting, and similar thing was done in the case of average number of decisions made and implemented.

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4.11 Citizen Charter and Anti-corruption Strategy

Survey results depict that more than 73% of sample Upazilas have prepared Citizen Charter. Those have not yet prepared citizen charter, 55% of them are in the process of preparing Citizen Charter and the rest are not working on it as they think that it has no importance or need. However, visiting Upazila websites, it has been revealed that 86% of project Upazilas and 93% of control Upazilas have so far prepared own citizen charter. The difference in information (that is available in the website and the one provided by Upazila officials) is attributed to lack of knowledge of the officials about it. Upon examining the existing citizen charter, we find that 83.3% of project Upazilas and 69.2% of control Upazilas have prepared the citizen charter following standard tabular format. The rest were prepared in different formats without following the standard tabular format. Citizen Charter is available in Upazila Parishad offices as well as in the respective upazilas websites. Survey findings suggest that Upazila Citizen Charter is also available in UP offices and Pouroshova offices in some cases.

Table 11: Availability of Citizen Charter Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Have Citizen charter?* Yes 85.7 92.85 90.47 No 14.3 7.15 9.53 If yes, whether it was prepared according to guideline format*Yes 83.3 69.2 66.67 No 16.7 30.8 33.33 Reasons for not preparing Citizen CharterNot given importance 33.33 37.49 36.35 No need of it 0.00 24.99 18.17 Ongoing process 33.31 62.51 54.56 Where to get citizen charter** Upazila Parishad office 100 100 100 UZP Website* 100 100 100 UP 57.14 60.71 59.52 N (# of Upazila) 14 28 42 Note: Information was based on both survey and Upazila websites; *website-based information; **valid cases were considered. Upazila officials (respondents) of both project and control Upazilas have claimed to have adopted some strategies to contain corruption. Preparing citizen charter is one of them, although this is related to effective public service delivery. Other anti-corruption strategies adopted include arranging discussion on budget (71% vs 54%), opinion sharing meeting (79% vs. 57%), following PPA and PPR in procurement (71% vs 57%), making frequent inspection of project sites and keeping complaint box at UZP (21% vs. 14%). It is observed that only a few Upazilas have so far introduced compliant box at UZP, indicating that UZPs did not give much importance to contain corruption and improve service delivery. The strategies mentioned here do not seem to be adequate to contain corruption in project selection and implementation.

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Table 12: Anti-corruption Strategy Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) What types of anti-corruption strategies undertaken?Prepared Citizen Charter 85.70 92.85 90.47 Sharing budget documents 71.43 39.29 50.00 Opinion sharing meeting 78.57 53.57 61.90 Internal auditing 57.14 42.86 47.62 Followed Public Procurement Rule (PPR) 71.43 57.14 61.90 Inspection of project site 64.29 60.71 61.90 Kept complain box in UZP 21.43 14.29 16.67 If no, why? Its not UZP’s responsibility 0.00 7.14 4.76 No instruction from upper level 7.14 10.71 9.52 N 14 28 42

4.12 Right to Information

Right to information (RTI) Act has been enacted in order to make public services accountable and transparent. Easy access to information is an important way of strengthening democracy at local level. More than 71% of project Upazilas and about 60% of control Upazilas have taken certain measures to implement various provisions of RTI Act. In 64.3% of project Upazilas and 42% of control Upazilas, an officer (in many cases Upazila Statistical officer) was found to be designated for RTI purposes. The rest of the Upazilas have not yet designated any of the officers for RTI purpose, mainly because, they claimed not to have any instruction from the LGRD and Cooperatives Ministry. In terms of implementation of RTI provisions, Upazilas perform poorly as only a few Upazilas (35.7% vs 21.4%) send details of the designated officer to Information Commission by 15 days of their designation, and, similarly only in few cases applicants were informed within 10 days in case of failure to provide them with necessary information (21.4% vs 10.7%). It has been observed that only 6 persons had applied for information in control Upazilas in last one year and all of them got information. However, it was not clear how long they had to wait for the required information. Annual report on RTI compliance was prepared by only 7% of Upazilas, others did not. Thus, there seems to have enough scope for further improvement in implementing RTI act to ensure transparency and accountability at the Upazila level.

Table 13: RTI Act and Its Implementation at Upazila Level Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Whether necessary measures are taken to implement RTI act 2009?Yes 71.43 59.09 63.89 No 28.57 40.91 36.11 What are the measures taken? An officer has been designated/assigned for RTI purpose

64.29 42.86 50.00

Full address of the designated official has been sent to Information Commission within 15 days

35.71 21.43 26.19

Applicants get required information 14.29 7.14 9.52

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regularly Applicants are informed within 10 days if it is not possible to provide them with required information

21.43 10.71 14.29

Reasons for not designating an officerWouldn’t know that an official has to be appointed/designated

20.0 43.75 50.0

No need of it 60.0 31.25 50.0 No instruction was given from LGRD and Cooperatives Ministry

80.0 37.5 62.5

How many applied for information under RTI (last one year) on average?

0.0 6 4

How many of the applicants received information (last one year) ?

0.0 6 4

How many of the applicants were informed within 10 days in case of failure to provide them with necessary information (last one year) (%)?

0.0 0.0 0.0

Has annual report on RTI been prepared? Yes 7.14 7.14 7.14 No 92.86 92.86 92.86 N 14 28 42

4.13 Working of UZP: What Elected Representatives Think?

We sought opinion from elected representatives on the working of UZP. More than 60% of the FGD respondents expressed their opinion that the UZP has not yet become much effective. Some respondents did not give any specific comments on whether UZP works properly or not. A very few respondents said that working of the UZP is not so bad.

The following statements made in FGDs specify the problems that hinder proper functioning of UZP.

• There is no specific job description or work list for the members of UZP, especially for vice chairs. In some cases, vice chairs do not get any official notice or letter. They think that their power and authority is very limited in the Upazila.

• As a government employee, UNO has control over line departments. In addition, the local MP, who is an advisor to the UZP, has more authority and power to control everything, including administrative and developmental matters. Due to this, the members of UZP have no freedom to do anything without permission of UNO or MP. Sometimes they have to take consent of both UNO and MP to do something. Moreover, they cannot play active role in project selection and implementation. In some cases it is found that UNO and UZC jointly play dominant role.

• Although, there are many laws, rules and circulars regarding activating the UZP, these are not executed properly at the field level.

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• The line departments are not transferred effectively. As a result, UZP has no information about how transferred departments carry out their functions.

• The UZPs do not get necessary allocation. The allocation that UZP gets, cannot be used independently by UZC or UZVCs separately, whereas, local MP gets direct allocation from the government and he can use it according to his priority.

• There are unfair interferences of MP as well as ruling party followers.

‘If the local MP or the higher level of the government interferes directly in doing all development activities, the UZP should be dissolved’. (FGD, Ishwardhi Upazila, Pabna)

The above statements made by elected representatives of UZP are worth considering as they pointed out some important hindrances making UZP more functional. In particular, their comments on implementation of rules and regulations, functioning of transferred departments, role of MP, job description of UZVC, etc. warrant further examination and revision of existing rules and regulations.

4.14 Opinion about Existing Rules, Circulars, etc.

About 20% of FGD respondents, who are also part of UZP, mentioned that there is no need to change the existing rules, circular, laws, etc., but it is important to execute them properly. Rest of the respondents of FGD felt the need of brining some of the following changes/addition to the existing laws, circular, rules:

• A circular needs to be issued from each concerned ministry or departments for ensuring ‘effectiveness’ of transfer of line department to the UZP, so that all activities of transferred departments are carried out under the direct supervision of UZP

• Rules related to the roles and responsibilities of Upazila vice chairs need to change for increasing their power and authority

• The rules specifying the modalities for implementation of development project by contractors need to be changed.

Women Representation in Upazila Table 14 shows the distribution of elected male and female representatives in UZP. In sample Upazilas, 100% of the elected chairmen are male. While apart from 50% female vice chairs (reserved seats), about 13% of the elected (regular seats) vice chairs were female in control Upazilas. Among the elected (general seats) vice-chairpersons, 100% in project Upazilas and 87% in control Upazilas are male. In total, 100% of the elected (in regular seats) Upazila chairmen were male, while 9.5% of vice chairs were female.

Table 14: Percentage of Elected Male and Female Representatives in Regular Seats of Upazila Parishad

Project Control Total male female male female Male Female

UZ Chairman 100.00 0.00 100.00 0.00 100.00 0.00 Vice Chairman 100.00 0.00 86.62 13.38 90.5 9.5

Note: women vice chair in reserved seats were not considered here. Women Development Forum Elections were not held in reserve seats in any of the Upazilas till date.

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Women Development Forum was created in 46% of project Upazilas and 61% of control Upazilas. In particular, on average, 6 and 3 forums were created in project and control Upazilas respectively.

Table 15: Gender issues Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Percentage of allocation for women and children in budget2010-11 5 24 16 2011-12 -- 24 24 Whether election held in reserved seatsYes 0 0 0 No 100 100 100 Whether Women Development Forum created Yes 46.5 39.29 41.46 No 53.5 60.71 58.54 If Yes, how many (average)? 6 3 4 *Information was collected from Women and Children Affairs Department at the Upazila.

4.15 Other Aspects of Upazila Governance: Opinions of Elected Representatives

The findings in this section are drawn from FGDs, which reflect the opinions of elected representatives of UZPs such as the UZ chairman, vice-chairs, and UP chairpersons. 4.15.1 Public Disclosure

Almost all FGD respondents, except one, reported that the following notices are also being posted in the UZP notice board for public display.

• Tender related documents • Different meeting related documents • List of project committees • Local job announcement • Office order and circular • Posters of national days • Information about departmental services

Only one Upazila out of 21 (5%) was found to have posted their citizen charter in the notice board.

4.16 Coordination between UZP (Upazila Parishad) and UP (Union Parishad)

There is an organic relationship between these two local government tiers. Chairmen of UPs within an Upazila are also members of the UZP. As they are majority in the UZP, their opinions often matter than others. According to the findings of FGDs, except one sample UZP, there is no problem in coordination between UZP and UP.

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4.17 Opinion regarding Satisfaction on Current UZP System

Most of the respondents of FGDs are not satisfied with the current UZP system, while a few respondents are satisfied with the running of UZP. The following are the causes behind their dissatisfaction with current UZP system.

• There is no specific job description and authorityare given to vice-chairs of UZP • Everything, even project approval and implementation, is controlled by local MP • UNO is given more power than UZC • No resource and scope are available in UZP to meet people’s need. • Losing their (elected representatives) popularity day by day due to not fulfilling

their commitments • No vehicle is collected for UZVCs • Transferred departments are not transferred effectively • Not informed about what transferred departments are doing • Land and police departments are not yet transferred to UZP

Almost all respondents participated in FGDs expressed that they had many expectations and commitment to their voters, such as creating corruption-free Upazila, improving law and order, ensuring accountability to the people, using resource properly, setting up new educational institutes, hospital and clinic, contributing to infrastructural as well as women development, reducing unemployment etc. But they could not meet their expectations and commitments because of lacking of power, authority and resources. They all are now frustrated.

4.18 Problems Faced by UZP and Suggestions for Its Improvement

According to FGD respondents, the problems faced by UZP and the suggestion for its improvement is the following.

Problems faced by UZP:

• Power misuse • No specific responsibilities of UZ Vice-chairs • No specific allocation for UZP • Limited authority • Always wait for order from UNO or MP. So UZC cannot work independently • Everything is controlled by MP • Lack of coordination between MP and UZC, UZC and UNO, UZC and UZVCs etc, • Unfair influence of party people and musclemen • List of party men maintained by MP • All activities carried out through previous departmental committees • No notice given by line ministry about officers transferred to UZP yet • No judicial power of UZP • The regulating power regarding leave, transfer and promotion of transferred

departments officials was not handed over to UZC • All power centralized within UZC and UNO

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Suggestions for Improvement of UZP

• Increase the authority and power of elected representatives of both UZP and UP • Holding UZP meeting regularly • Like MP, there should have allocations of fund for the elected representatives of UZP

separately • Determine specific job descriptions for UZP Vice-chairs have to be determined

separately • Improve relationship between UZC and officers and maintaining proper coordination • Ensure participation of respective officer in project selection and its implementation • Ensure accountability of project activities by the presence of related officers • Provide training (through PATC) to all members of UZP on budgeting, development

plans etc. • Take action against bribery • Ensure administrative assistance • Specific work distribution of UNO and UZC for effectiveness of UZP • Make transfer of line departments effective • Increase allocation for UZP • Separate allocation of UZPVCs • Take initiative for local resource mobilization • Stop interference from upper level • Handed over power to UZP for giving budget allocation to the departments • Abolish the advisory role of MP.

It appears that too many suggestions have come from elected representatives, of which some are too general. Some of their concerns are valid, which needs to be considered. Our observation regarding some of their suggestions is as follows.

• It is not desirable that bureaucrats/ministry specify the job descriptions of UZPVCs. The UZP itself should do it and they should work together as per the guidelines. In the context of above suggestions,

• It has been revealed that vice chairs are more frustrated for not having their specific job description and authority on administrative matters. The vice chairs are statutorily given the authority to chair all (standing) Committees, and they have some broader roles and responsibilities as mentioned in UZP Manual, though the roles were not spelled out clearly. It mainly depends on UZ chairs how s/he allocates the duties to UZVC. Moreover, UZVCs are not happy partly because Committees are yet to be functional. One way to solve this problem is to make Committees more functional and allocating duties to UZVC as per the manual.

• The role of MP in Upazila is a controversial issue, which needs to be addressed for making the Upazila system more functional. Elected representatives also want separate allocation for them as like as MP, which we think should not be entertained at this (pre-mature) stage of Upazila system. Even alloaction to MPs are illegal as they have no developmental role at the local level. Also, allocation should be made to the Parishad, not to individual representatives.

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• Rather, existing allocation under ADP can be enhanced for Upazilas so that they can undertake some more development projects. Conditional block grants can also be diverted to Upazila Parishads. It is also urged by FGD respondents to take strong anti-corruption strategies. Our survey findings also support their views as it reveals that anti-corruption strategies are not that much strong at the Upazila level.

4.19 Upazila Websites and E-governance

The Access to Information (A2I) program of the Prime Minister’s Office and BASIS (Bangladesh Association of Software Information Services) have taken initiatives to develop individual web portal for all Upazilas. A good progress has been made so far as many individual upazilas web portals have been developed by this time. This is an important progress in terms of ensuring e-governance at the Upazila level as well as to materialize the “Digital Bangladesh” vision of the Government. However, this is indeed a first step towards e-governance at the Upazila level. Note that e-governance (e-G) allows speedy transmittal of information to many people at the same time, retrieval and processing of information, and mutual monitoring of actions of various economic, social, legal and political agents in society. All these allow transparency, voice to the citizens and make the administration more accountable with lower costs of transaction. E-G opens up the possibility of multi-directional interactions. It allows people to people, government to government, people to government, government to people, business to government and government to business contact through the medium of ICT. To improve the e-governance, the Upazila websites already developed need to be updated on a regular basis with all relevant information including project selection and implementation processes, Upazila budget, annual and five year plan, anti-corruption strategies, online complain posting, information on meetings and its minutes etc. For this purpose, a web-master needs to be appointed or any other officer at the Upazila level needs to be trained on website design and upgradation. Use of e-mail by all UZP elected representatives and officials can be made mandatory. All meeting calls, working papers and minutes of the meetings can be communicated through e-mails. UP Chairs, who are members of UZP, can also be communicated through e-mail as Union Parishad Information Center (USIC) is available in almost all UPs.

4.20 Summary

Among secondary legislative instruments, particularly 6 rules out of 14 (Article 63(2) of the Act, 2009) has been finalized. The rest has not yet been finalized, for which Upazila activitivies are hampered to some extent. It is thereore recommended to finalize the rules as soon as possible. Among the guidelines and instruments, Upazila manual, budget and development planning guidelines, etc., are available in almost all Upazilas. However, it has been observed that majority of the UZ officials and elected representatives do not know the contents (rules/regulations) of these instruments, indicating that they need to be trained on rules and regulations. RTI Act compliance has been poor as only a few Upazilas maintain??? compliances properly. A specific officer should be designated in each Upazila to comply with RTI provisions, and the information about this should be made available in the Upazila

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website. Disclosure of online information is apparently limited. More efforts should be made to ensure e-governance at the Upazila level. Findings show that committees (standing) were formed in 35% of project Upazilas and 75% of control Upazilas as of June 30, 2012. Control Upazilas are well ahead of project Upazilas in terms of forming committees. Committees were formed with 6 members (on average) in all sample Upazilas, which is consistent with the Act. Although committees are supposed to meet at least once in every two months, that is, at least 6 times in a year, findings suggest that some of the committees met twice and most of the committees met only once in the last one year (2011-12), particularly in project Upazilas. In control Upazilas, meetings of most of the committees were not held in the last year, although these committees were formed much earlier. It can be observed that in 90% cases the chairperson of two committees, Women and Children Affairs and Social Welfare, are women. Women also lead some other committees in some Upazilas. However, there have been apprehensions among the members of various committees that committees meet just to maintain government rules—they do not have any role to play as the decisions are made according to central government’s instructions. Committee recommendations are not even placed in UZP meetings and decisions are mainly made or executed by UNO and bureaucrats. So, elected representatives are largely ignored in the decision making process of functionaries, which could be an obstacle strengthening the Upazila system with its democratic mandate. Survey results indicate that meetings of UZP held regularly in all Upazilas. In almost all Upazilas, working paper before the meeting and minutes after the meetings are also prepared. It can be observed that the UNO mainly calls the meeting, while in some cases Upazila chairman does this in absence of UNO, which is not consistent with the Act. In 50% cases, a prior notice of the meeting is served a week before the meeting as per rule. It can be observed from the respondent’s responses that every participant can freely express his/her opinion in the meetings, although in FGDs it is reported that women participants cannot express their voice freely in some cases. Local MP, as an advisor to UZP, attends the meetings irregularly. However, it has been reported that local MP or his/her representatives in many cases influences the decision making process of the Upazila Parishad. In sum, after 4 years of election in UZP, the Parishad has not been functioning as expected. Election in reserved seats has not been held yet. Parishad meetings are held regularly, though UZ chairs often complain that local MP influences major decisions. Standing committees meet sporadically without having strong control on decision making processes of respective line departments. To make the Committees functional, it is suggested that other (parallel or competing) line department committees should work under the guidance of (standing) Committees. The issue of e-governance has been ignored or overlooked in UZG project outputs/outcomes, which needs to be taken into account for further evaluation. Improvement of e-governance may likely to solve various governance related problems mentioned by the respondents. These are the areas of concern for making UZP a vibrant and democratic local government unit.

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CHAPTER 5 BUDGET AND DEVELOPMENT PLANNING OF UPAZILA PARISHAD

This chapter provides information on annual budget and development planning of Upazilas. Information on different heads of Upazila budget enables people to know the fiscal position of their Upazilas, development expenditures and plans as well as resource mobilization capacities. The information on budget and development planning has been analyzed by at the budget and plan documents collected from the sample Upazilas.

5.1 Annual Budget Preparation

Findings show that about 57% of project Upazilas and 39% of control Upazilas have prepared annual budget of respective Upazilas as of June 30, 2012. Of them, majority Upazilas have prepared their first budget in 2010-11. It is observed that among the Upazilas, that have prepared budget, most of them did not follow all the standard procedures of budget preparation. When asked, it was mentioned that budgets were prepared (about 50% of budgets in project Upazilas and 39% of control Upazilas) following the standard procedures of budget preparation as mentioned in the Upazila Parishad Manual. However, when respondents were specifically asked about different procedures, the responses do not completely match with their claim. For example, in the case of procedures, 71.4% of project Upazilas and about 43% of control Upazilas sent draft budget to the local MP, UPs, Pouroshova, Press club, etc. for comments and opinions; while less than 20% of both project and control Upazilas publish it in their websites. About 64% of project Upazilas and 50% of control Upazilas claimed that they have incorporated comments received from different stakeholders in the budget. Thus, it seems that although majority of upazilas followed one or two procedures, they did not follow other standadrd procedures. It is therefore important to work on this issue so that they comply with all the procedures of budget preparation. The Upazilas those have not yet prepared budget, cited as the reasons for lack of resource and manpower, transfer of UNO, etc. Most of the respondents, who were involved in Upazila budget preparation, mentioned that MDGs were not considered in the preparation of Upazila development budget. No such guidelines are also available in this regard. This is an area where Upazila Governance Project might focus on. Line departments’ budget have not been integrated with the Upazila budget yet, which points to the fact that line departments have not been transferred fully yet. This issue is also related to making (standing) Committees functional so that proper disclosure of line departments’ budget allocation to UZP can be made. Integration of line department budgets is important for making Upazila budget a complete one. Table 16: Annual Budget Preparation Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Whether budget was prepared as of June 30, 2012? Yes 57.14 39.28 45.23 No 42.86 60.72 54.77 Whether appropriate procedures were followed in budget preparation? Yes 50.00 39.29 42.86 No 50.00 60.71 57.14

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If yes, what are the procedures? Draft budget send to MP, Ups, Pouroshova, Press club etc

71.43 42.86 52.38

Publish in the UZP website 21.43 14.29 16.67 Open discussion with citizens (teachers, professionals, UP chairmen and members, NGOs, Bankers etc.)

50.00 39.29 42.86

Budget approved after incorporating all comments

64.29 50.00 54.76

Whether MDGs have been given priority in the budget?Yes -- -- -- No 100.00 100.00 100.00Whether line departments’ budget integrated? (No)

100.00 100.00 100.00

N 14 28 42 There is no specific person designated to prepare annual budget of Upazila. The findings show that various UZP officials are involved with the budget preparation process. For example, UZP chairman/Vice chairman, UNO, Office super/clerk, Upazila engineer or LGED accountant were found to prepare Upazila budget in different Upazilas. In most cases, UZP chair, UNO and Upazila Engineer took the main responsibility preparing of budget. Upazila engineer seems to have important role in budget preparation as he/she has all information regarding expenditures/demands on infrastructure. On revenue side, UNO has important role because he/she has updated information on revenue income of the Upazila. Therefore, it seems that coordination between different line departments is important for making a complete budget for the Upazila. From the interview of the persons who were usually involved with budget preparation, it has been revealed that most of them do not have any prior experience or training on budgeting. However, from 43% of the project Upazilas we got impression that those who prepared budget have received some sorts of training. Nonetheless, without having proper training on budgeting, it is difficult to prepare a realistic budget for the Upazila. Not only being an important development document of Upazila, there might have the possibility to integrate Upazila budget with national budget in the future7. In this context, annual upazila budget should be prepared with utmost care.

Table 17: Budget Preparation Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Who prepares budget? UZP Chairman 62.5 72.7 68.4 UZP Vice Chairman 50.0 54.5 52.6 UNO/Office Super/Head Clerk 62.5 100.0 84.2 Upazila Engineer 75.0 72.7 73.7 LGED Accountant 25.0 45.5 36.8 Do they have experience/training of budget preparation?Yes 42.86 14.29 23.81 No 42.86 46.43 45.24 Don’t Know 14.29 39.29 30.95 7 The Government might consider Upazila budgets (expenditures and resource mobilization) while allocating ADP for different departments and Ministries in the national budget. Upazila budget could be a guideline for the allocation of ADP to Upazilas.

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If yes, who trained them? NILG trainer 28.57 7.14 14.29 ADC (revenue) official 7.14 0.00 2.38 Divisional Commissioner’s office 14.29 3.57 7.14 N 14 28 42

5.2 UZP Budget Preparation: FGD and KII Findings

FGD reports revealed that a good number of the sample UZPs have prepared their budget for 2012-2013 for the first time. The UZP budget was prepared with participation of officials of the line departments, and approved in the UZP meeting with the consent of all members of UZP. It is noted that six Upazilas out of 21 Upazilas (28.5%) have arranged open budget meetings for sharing budget documents. Most of the Line Department Official (KII) respondents expressed that they have heard about UZP budget, but there was no allocation for their respective departments separately. A very few respondents told that they were informed regarding allocation for their departments in UZP budget. In addition, all respondents said that they have got allocation from their line ministry in each year to carry out their programs. In most cases, UZP do not even know the amount of money the various transferred departments get.

5.3 Peoples’ Participation in UZP Planning, Budgeting and Scheme Selection

More than 80% of the respondents expressed ignorance about any budget of their UZP. A very few respondents said that they know about budget of their respective Upazila. Though, they were informed by a letter issued from UZP, they did not participate in the process.

KII respondents of community expressed that project/scheme is prepared in most cases by the suggestion of either MP or UNO and in some cases by UZP and other government officials.

More than 50 percent of respondents did not take part in the process of project selection, however, some said positively of having opportunity to take part in the scheme selection process. Some said that they were not informed or were ignored. In this case, they mentioned of the following measures to be undertaken to ensure transparency in scheme selection:

• More participation by people • More disclosure • Strengthen monitoring mechanism

5.4 Budget Analysis

Analysing budgets of Upazilas it is found that almost all project Upazilas and 55% of control Upazilas prepared surplus budget; about 36% of project Upazilas did not show balance (surplus or deficit) of budget, suggesting that they are incomplete. Only one control Upazil found that prepared deficit budget. However, majority of project and control Upazilas showed revenue surplus (Table 18). This surplus budget triggers to the point that UZPs are less capable in expenditure absorption as they are unable to absorb all revenue and development earnings.

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Table 18: Budget 2011-12 Area Project

(2011-12) Control

(2011-12) Revenue surplus 7 8 Revenue deficit 0 0 Total budget surplus 7 6 Total budget deficit 0 1 Balanced budget (not shown)

1 4

Total Upazila 8 11 Analyzing revenue income and expenditure heads of Upazilas, it is observed that the main earning comes from lease of hat/bazaar/pond/jalmahal, which constitutes about 41% of total revenue income in 2010-11 and 46% in 2011-12. The ratio is higher among control Upazilas than project Upazilas. The next big source of revenue income in 2010-11 and 2011-12 was income from house/office rent (26%). These two sources are reported by all Upazilas. The other sources of income include 2% of land development tax (2%), tax from business entities (3%) and tender schedule sell. About 5-6 Upazilas have reported “1% of land transfer tax” as the main source of revenue (about 40%). On the other hand, major revenue expenditure heads are honorarium of Upazila chairman and Vice chairs and salary of Upazila staffs (12.5% vs 24% of total expenditure in 2011), provident fund (20% vs 4%), office and building repair (14.5% vs 8.3%), vehicle maintenance, repair and fuel cost (9.68% vs 1.21%), and expenditure for tax collection. Revenue income has been found to be 48% of development expenditure (ADP) in 2010-11 and 46% in 2011-12. Thus, revenue-ADP ratio remained almost the same in 2010-11 and 2011-12, indicating that there is no important upward change in revenue generation in sample Upazilas.

Figure 2: Sources of revenue income of Upazilas

1%

36%

24%

11%

14%

0% 11%

0%

3%

Project

2% land

income from hat/bazar izara

income from house rent

others

previous balance

registra

schedule sell

tax from business

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5.4.1 Development Grants and Expenditures

Majority of project and control Upazilas’ main source of development fund is development grants (ADP) from the central government (about 90% in project and 70% (plus previous year’s balance—which may constitute about 90% or more) in control Upazilas. Other sources constitute very little of the fund. Examining development expenditures of the Upazilas, it is observed that major expenditure head is the infrastructure (both physical and socio-economic heads), followed by agriculture and irrigation, education, health, and disaster and relief. Majority of the sample Upazila did not show any expenditure on poverty reduction head (social safety net and institutional support) except a few. As Upazilas are spending on health, education, women and children development and poverty reduction, they are indirectly addressing MDGs to some extent; however more focus should be given on it.

5.5 Annual Development Plan and Five Year Plan

Almost all Upazilas claimed that they have guideline on annual plan. This is true in the sense that there is a brief section in UZP Manual on how to use development fund where it is briefly said to make annual plan of UZP. If this is the only guideline on annual plan, then all Upazilas that have UZP manual, also have annual plan. However, no complete and comprehensive annual development plan guideline is so far available for UZP. About 43% of project and 48.2% of control Upazilas claimed to have prepared an annual development plan. In fact, the plan is not a comprehensive development plan of the Upazila,

2%

43%

26%

8%

8%

0% 9%

0%

4%

Control

2% land

income from hat/bazar izara

income from house rent

others

previous balance

registra

schedule sell

tax from business

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rather this is a stocktaking of annual demand notes of different UPs. However, officials from almost all surveyed Upazilas mentioned that no training was provided on the planning guidelines, and that’s why it is difficult for them to prepare a comprehensive annual development plan.

Table 19: Annual Development Plan Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Have annual development plan?Yes 42.86 48.15 46.34 No 57.14 51.85 53.66 Does UZP have annual development planning guideline?Yes 100.00 96.00 97.30 No 0.00 4.00 2.70 Have UZP officials given training on development plan and budgeting guidelines? Yes 16.67 24.00 21.62 No 83.33 76.00 78.38 N 14 28 42 None of the project Upazilas has prepared a five year plan (FYP) yet. On the other hand, a few, about 10%, of control Upazilas (3 Upazilas) have prepared their five year plan. However, none of the Upazilas have any guideline for preparing FYP. Lack of skilled personnel and limited resources were the main reasons for not preparing the FYP.

Most of the KII respondents expressed that they are not informed about the five year plan or annual plan of UZP. A very few respondents told that there are five year plans in their UZPs. It is found that only 3 Upazilas so far have prepared FYP, namely Chouddagram, Brahmanpara and Akkelpur, with the help of external support.

Similarly, a significant percentage of Upazilas (62%) claimed to have Plan Book, as such this is an LGED planning book on infrastructure development of the Upazila, prepared mainly based on guideline circulated in the 1980s. Even we find one recently prepared Plan Book of Noakhali Sadar Upazila available in the website, which is not a planning book, per se. Circulation of updated guidelines on different plans and planning book appears to be an important way to enhance development activities at the Upazila level. However, current focuses are only on infrastructure development, which is a very misleading way of looking into local level development.

Table 20: Five Year Plan and related Information Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Has five year development plan been prepared?Yes 0.00 10.53 7.14 No 100.00 89.47 92.86 If not, why? Lack of skilled personnel 64.29 46.43 52.38 Lack of resource 57.14 42.86 47.62 No instruction from upper level 28.57 25.00 26.19 If Yes, which year it was prepared? -- 2011-12 --

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Do UZP officials have proper training on five year plan?Yes 0 0 0 No 100 100 100 Do UZP have guideline for FYP? Yes 0 0 0 No 100 100 100 Whether plan was prepared incorporating deprived section of the society? Yes -- -- -- No 100 100 100 Have any planning book? Yes 50.0 67.86 61.9 No 50.0 32.14 38.1 N 14 28 42 From the survey results it has been revealed that Upazilas do not have any designated person/s or wing that are responsible for annual budgeting and planning. Only guideline may not be sufficient for making a five year plan. A few Upazilas, for example Chouddagram Upazila, Brahmonpara and Akkelpur, have so far prepared five year plans, by taking technical assistance from outside agency, namely Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (BARD), Comilla and The Hunger Project. It is therefore recommended to establish a designated wing at the Upazila level that will be responsible for the preparation of budget and development plans.

5.6 Planning and Project/Scheme Selection: FGD Findings

All FGD respondents including Upazila chairs told that they have not yet prepared any five year plan. A few Upazilas have prepared only annual plan with the participation of all members of respective UZP. According to their opinion, the reasons for not preparing five year plan are lack of proper guideline for preparing such plan, lack of resources, lack of technical assistance, lack of personnel etc. However, although most UZPs have not yet prepared annual plan or long term plan, all UZPs identify and implement different types of projects for local development, of which the ADP projects are the most important one. They said all projects/schemes were selected and implemented following the respective government rules and circulars. Regarding project selection, FGD respondents expressed that UP Chairman prepares the list of schemes, and placed it to Upazila meeting.

5.7 Capacity building on budgeting and planning guideline

Preparing budget and different development Plans (Annual and Five Year) have important bearings on local level development. This is also not an easy task. Not only technical know-how is required for these specific tasks, a clear guideline is also required for Upazila officials and elected representatives for accomplishing these tasks. The budget guidelines so far provided by LGD apparently are helpful for preparing the budget. However, guidelines on annual plan is inadequate and five year plan non-existent. Therefore, a comprehensive guideline on Plan can be formulated by making it consistent with national plans so that such local level plans can be integrated into the national one.

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From the survey, it has been revealed that transfer of UNO before budget preparation in some cases created problem for some of the Upazilas. No such dedicated person is available in Upazila parishad who can take it forward in absence of UNO or Upazila Engineer. In some cases, Upazila chair took the initiative, but initiatives proved to be inadequate. Therefore, it is important not to transfer two important persons, such as UNO and Upazila Engineer, before budget preparation. Moreover, all UNOs, LGED engineers and other related Upazila officials should be given adequate training on Upazila budgeting and development planning before they are posted to a specific Upazila. The training on budgeting and planning could be arranged for Upazila officials by NILG. The LGRD and Cooperatives Ministry can consider setting up a separate and dedicated budget wing at Upazila under the auspices of UZ chairperson, which will be responsible for gathering all necessary information from respective departments and UPs during the fiscal year and preparing budget and development plans. In that case, transfer of certain officials would not hamper the preparation of budget and plan.

5.8 Summary

Survey findings show that despite a guideline/instruction from the LGRD and Cooperative Ministry to prepare annual budget, majority of sample Upazilas have not prepared annual budget (as of June 30, 2012). Only 57% (8) of project Upazilas and 39% (11) of control Upazilas have prepared annual budget as of June 30, 2012. There are various reasons for not preparing budget, such as transfer of UNO, sickness of UZP chairman, lack of resource and appropriate person, etc. Among the Upazilas that have prepared budget, almost all followed some of the procedures (but not all) of budget preparation as outlined in the guideline, for example, took comments from different stakeholders and placed it to UZP meetings for approval. However, arranging open budget discussion is still a far reaching objective. It has been observed that the main earning of Upazila comes from lease of hat/bazaar/pond/jalmahal (46%), followed by rent from house/offices (26%). The other sources of income include 2% of land development tax (2%), tax from business entities (3%) and tender schedule sell (11%). About 5-6 Upazilas showed 1% of land transfer tax as about 40% of their revenue receipts. On the other hand, major revenue expenditure heads are honorarium of Upazila chairman and Vice chairs and salary of Upazila staffs (12.5% vs 24% of total expenditure in 2011), provident fund (20% vs 4%), office and building repair (14.5% vs 8.3%), vehicle maintenance, repair and fuel cost (9.68% vs 1.21%), and expenditure for tax collection. Revenue income has been found to be 48% of development expenditures (ADP) in 2010-11 and 46% in 2011-12. Thus, revenue-ADP ratio remained almost the same in 2010-11 and 2011-12, indicating that there is no important upward change in revenue generation in sample Upazilas. Majority of project and control Upazilas main source of development fund is development grants (ADP) from the central government (about 90% in project and 70% (it will be about 90% if we add up previous year’s balance) in control Upazilas). Other sources constitute very little of the fund. The main expenditure head is the infrastructure (both physical and socio-economic heads), followed by agriculture and irrigation, education, health and disaster and relief. Majority of the sample Upazilas did not show any expenditure on poverty reduction head (social safety net and institutional support) except a few. As Upazilas are spending on health, education, women and children development and poverty reduction, they are addressing indirectly some MDGs to some extent; however, more focus should be given on it.

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In practice, Upazilas do not consider MDGs while preparing the annual budget. They mainly focus on infrastructure development, which needs to be shifted to other MDGs. Almost all sample Upazilas have annual plan guideline; however, none of them have guideline on Five Year Plan. Some Upazilas have already prepared annual development plan, albeit not comprehensively. A few Upazilas have prepared their five year plan with the help of external support. The UZGP project could work on it. It is our understanding that the Five Year Plan must be based on a series of consultation processes with local departments (public), private entities and people of the Upazila to accommodate the vision of the Upazila and to set up a guideline on how to materialize those visions. There must have a clear distribution of resources and sources of financing. Annual budget and development plan must commensurate with the Five Year Plan. Moreover, in broader sense, Upazila FYP should take into account of broader objectives of national FYP. It appears that Upazilas are now preparing budget to meet statutory requirements. The quality of budget is questionable because of lack of their capacity on it. The way the budget is now being prepared lacks the visions of overall development of Upazilas. The budget must commensurate with the vision and mission stipulated in the annual and five year plan. This is area where appropriate skills are absent at the Upazila Parishad. Thus, lack of resources and training of respective officials are the main impediments to prepare budget and plans. Capacity development of Upazila officials is necessary in this regard. In particular, a specific budget wing can be set up at Upazila Parishad to prepare budget and development plan. More training and skill development programs should be undertaken to increase skills of the persons responsible for budget and plan preparation.

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CHAPTER 6

CITIZEN’S PERCEPTION TOWARDS UPAZILA PARISHAD GOVERNANCE

This chapter assesses citizens’ perception towards various aspects of Upazila Parishad. We mainly assess citizen’s perception towards the quality of services available at the Upazila level, functioning of Upazila system, and activities of elected Upazila Parishad chairman, Vice chairmen and others. For this purpose, a total of 1,670 citizens were interviewed from the selected Upazilas. KIIs were conducted with informed citizens in this study. A total of 179 citizens, 41 UP members, 34 businessmen, 25 political leaders, 46 teachers, 18 NGO service holders, 02 bankers and 4 ex-govt. officers were interviewed. Union Parishad chairments were not interviewed because of their direct involvement at the UZP.

6.1 Respondents Profile

Respondents’ characteristics are reported in Table 21. About two-third of the respondents are male and one-third are female. About 70% of the respondents are of age between 20 and 50 years. Regarding their educational qualification, about 16% of the respondents are illiterate, while about 20% respondents, in both project and control areas, can sign only. While about 22% respondents have primary education, 20.7% of respondents have secondary level education. Only a small proportion of respondents have completed SSC and above. Average family size is around 5.5 in both project and control areas, which is higher than that of national level (4.5 in 2010, according to BBS). Monthly household income and expenditure are higher in control areas than the project areas.

Table 21: Respondents Household Profile Project Control Total

Average family size 5.30 5.54 5.46 Sex Male (%) 63.24 64.43 64.04 Female (%) 36.58 35.39 35.78 Average monthly income (Tk) 7718.56 9107.33 8646.9 Average monthly expenditure (Tk) 7573.69 8479.85 8179.42 Age (%) Below 19 years 0.36 0.8 0.66 20-29 21.44 22.43 22.10 30-39 27.39 27.44 27.42 40-49 22.34 23.86 23.36 50-59 14.77 13.85 14.16 60+ 13.69 11.62 12.31 Education (%) Illiterate 14.23 16.19 15.54Can read only 1.08 0.36 0.60

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Can sign only 20.54 18.60 19.25Can read & sign only 4.32 6.62 5.86Primary and below 23.06 21.56 22.05Secondary 19.46 20.66 20.25S.S.C 9.01 8.14 8.43HSC 4.68 3.76 4.06Graduate & above 3.62 4.11 1.92

In terms of occupation of the respondents, majority were involved in agriculture and agriculture wage labour (35.3%). Other notable occupations include non-agriculture wage labour and small businesses. It can be observed from Table 22 that almost all female respondents are housewives.

Table 22: Major occupation of the respondents Main Occupation Project (%) Control

(%)Total (%)

Agriculture 28.7 28.92 28.85 Agri. Wage labourer 7.58 5.91 6.46 Non-agri wage labourer 3.97 3.67 3.27 Service (GO/NGO) 2.35 1.88 2.03 Small trading/business 4.87 6.18 5.75 Big business 2.35 3.85 3.35 Students 1.62 2.33 2.09 Housewife 36.28 33.93 34.71 Others 12.28 13.33 12.81

6.2 UZP Services and their quality

To understand respondents’ awareness about the Upazila Parishad and its activities, they were asked whether they visit Upazila and if so how many times they visited UZP in last three months. Table 23 shows that about 60% of respondents visit UZP in different occasions and on average they visited UZP 3 times in last 3 months. Most of the respondents visit Upazila in the morning. Regarding the purpose of visit, the most cited purpose was health (69.1%), followed by land related purposes (35% vs 41%), banking service (about 23%) and local conflict resolution (about 15%). Interestingly, a significant portion of respondents visit UZP in order to resolve local conflicts with the help of UZC or UZVC. The other purposes for visiting upazilas were related to law and order (8-10%), fisheries and livestock (7.3%), education (8.2%), family planning (9.1%) etc. From the findings it has been revealed that people mainly visit Upazila for health and land purposes, and then for resolving local conflicts.

Table 23: Respondents Opinion about Quality of Public Services Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Have you visited Upazila? Yes 59.46 58.53 58.84 No 40.54 41.47 41.16 How many times in last 3 months 3 3 3

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(average)? At day-time when do you usually visit UZP?

Morning 87.46 85.95 86.44 Noon 8.46 9.97 9.48 Afternoon 1.88 1.36 1.53 Others 2.19 2.57 2.45 Purposes of visit Land related works 34.55 41.17 40.2 Health services 66.36 70.5 69.14 Family planning 8.18 9.61 9.13 Education related works 6.96 8.85 8.22 Fisheries and livestock related works 7.57 7.17 7.30 Project related works in Upazila 6.67 3.51 4.56 Resolve local conflict 16.67 13.43 14.52 Banking service 23.63 22.13 22.63 Law and order issue 7.87 10.68 9.75 Sports and culture related works 2.12 2.90 2.63 Respondents were asked to evaluate the quality of services of line departments at the Upazila level on a 5-point scale. In most cases, they graded the quality of services provided by line departments at the upazila level as very poor (bad). There is no difference in quality of services in both project and control Upazilas. The quality of communication and infrastructure and agriculture and irrigation services were rated as bad in both areas. The services rendered by law and order, primary and mass education, secondary and madrasa education and health and family welfare departments were relatively better than other departments.

Table 24: Evaluation of Services of Line Departments by Respondents Type of Services Project

(average score)

Control (average

score)

Total (average

score) Law and order 3 3 3 Communication and infrastructure development 4 3 3 Agriculture and irrigation 4 4 4 Secondary and madrasha education 3 3 3 Primary and mass education 3 3 3 Health and family welfare 3 3 3 Youth and sports 5 5 5 Women and children development 5 5 5 Social welfare 4 5 5 Freedom fighter 4 5 5 Fisheries and livestock 5 5 5 Rural development and cooperative 5 5 5 Culture 5 5 5 Forest and environment 5 5 5 Observation, monitoring and controlling of market price 5 5 5 Finance, budget, planning and mobilization of local resources 5 5 5

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Public health, sanitation and supply of safe drinking water. 4 4 4 Land related service 5 4 4 Note: 1.Very Good, 2.Good 3. Average 4. Bad, 5. Very Bad In addition, respondents gave their opinion on their satisfaction level on certain civic facilities available at the Upazila level (Table 25). They rated the quality of bus/truck/tempo stand and market/hat bazar as “average”, while that of others such as Upazila library, entertainment facilities and sports field as bad.

Table 25: Satisfaction Level on Civic Facility Civic facility of Upazila Project

(average score) Control

(average score) Total

Upazila Library 5 5 5 Entertainment 5 5 5 Sports field 4 4 4 Vehicle congestion 4 3 3 Bus/ truck/tempo stand 4 4 4 Market place/hat bazar 3 3 3 Note: Evaluation Score--1.Very Good, 2.Good 3. Average 4. Bad 5. Very Bad In terms of access to respective UZP officials, majority of the respondents (80%) who usually visit upazila said that it is possible to meet respective UZP officials if necessary. Amongst officials, Upazial chairman is the most accessible person to citizen (Table 26: Access to UZP officials).

Table 26: Access to UZP officials

Whether it is possible to meet UZP officials

Project (%)

Control (%)

Total (%)

Yes 82.64 78.89 80.14 No 17.36 21.11 19.86 To whom it is easier to meet UZP Chairman 56.40 59.57 60.48 Vice Chairman 32.25 39.40 38.32 Woman Vice Chair 27.39 35.73 34.13 UNO 25.59 27.61 27.84

6.3 Awareness and Satisfaction about Upazila Parishad Activities

It was assessed as to whether respondents are aware of the the mandated activities of Upazila Parishads as mentioned in Table 27. It is found that awareness about Upazila activities varies across types of activities. For example, while majority of the respondents are aware of activities related to public service delivery, they are not quite aware of some mandated activities like preparation of annual budget and various development plans. In terms of degree of awareness, Upazila activities can be ranked as follows: making connecting roads between unions (80%), improvement of law and order

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by preventing theft, robbery etc. (80%), health and family planning (70%), sanitation/supply of drinking water (60%), education (60%), development of agriculture, livestock and fisheries (42%) and violence against women (40%). However, respondents’ are not satisfied at all with the services provided by UZP

Table 27: Awareness and Satisfaction on Activities of Upazila Parishad Type of Activities (Read to the respondents)

Project Control Total Project Control Total

Have idea (%)

Have idea (%)

Have idea (%)

Satisfied (%)

Satisfied (%)

Satisfied (%)

Prepare five year plan and other development plans

2.35 2.6 2.5 15.38 21.43 19.51

Implementation / coordination of different government agency agenda

8.14 10.38 9.27 2.22 9.48 7.45

Construction/ maintenance and repaire of inter-union roads

82.28 78.53 80.4 8.65 9.02

8.89 Selection & implementation of small irrigation projects

22.24 19.84 21.0 6.67 4.98 5.57

Public health, nutrition, and family planning service

69.62 69.69 69.2 17.75 18.04 17.95

Sanitation, drainage and supply of safe drinking water

64.08 61.74 62.85 9.77 13.68

12.37 Expand of Upazila wide education 57.17 60.65 58.9 18.79 22.37

21.23 Maintenance and donate for secondary and madrasha education

52.45 55.55 53.97 14.19 19.48

17.79 Expand and build of small industries 5.44 5.1 5.25 23.33 17.54

19.54 Financing assistance to cooperative societies and voluntary organizations.

6.88 9.06 7.97 7.89 19.8

16.55

Assistance to women, children, social welfare, youth and cultural activities

32.91 28.11 30.5 6.59 12.78

10.51

Development of agriculture, livestock, fisheries and forestry

42.26 42.87 42.6 6.06 11.65

9.82 Improvement of law and order 82 80.02 81.0 14.67 13.96

14.2 Self employment and poverty reduction 28.1 23.01 25.55 0.65 2.76

1.97

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Coordination and assistance to development activities of Union Parishad

17.75 20.47 19.11 6.19 11.06

9.6

Protect acid through, abuse of children and women

44.46 40.49 42.25 28.98 26.85 27.6

Protecting theft, robbery, use of narcotics, terrorism etc.

72.36 69.09 70.7 17.93 18.12 18.06

Social welfare 8.51 11.97 10.3 4.44 11.28 9.55 Disaster management 24.73 14.31 19.5 4.48 8.28 6.53 Cooperation with other organizations 2.72 4.43 3.55 13.33 14.58

14.29Encourage e-governance services 1.09 1.27 1.18 16.67 13.33

14.29 Any duty imposed by govt 2.91 6.17 4.5 12.5 20.9 19.28

Total (average) 33.2 32.55 32.77 12.9 15.15 14.4 Note: Valid cases are considered. About 50% or more are in the middle of satisfaction and dissatisfaction. Only 10.1% of the respondents in project areas and about 13% in control areas are aware of annual development plan of their own Upazila (Table 28).

Table 28: Percentage of Respondents Who Know about Annual Development Plan of Upazila

Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Yes 10.11 12.89 11.97No 89.89 87.11 88.03N 554 1,116 1,670

Regarding project selection process, almost all respondents were found ignorant, that is, they do not know anything about the project selection process at the Upazila level. This finding is expected in the sense that no such mechanism has yet been developed to involve citizens in project selection and implementation process at the upazila level.

Table 29: Do Citizens have any Idea About Project Selection

Any idea about project selection?

Project (%)

Control (%)

Total

Yes 0.9 1.43 1.26No 99.1 98.3 98.56N 554 1,116 1,670

Among the KII respondents, 50% respondents expressed satisfaction, 44% dissatisfaction and the rest had expressed no opinion.

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The satisfaction level of KIs regarding performance of UZC and UZVCs were scored in 1-5 (1-Excellent, 5-very bed) scale, which is shown in the Table below:

Table 30: Performance Evaluation by Community Respondents (KII) Score 1 2 3 4 5

UZC 8% 20% 56% 14% 2% UZVC (Male) 4% 30% 44% 18% 4% UZVC (Female) 4% 34% 40% 16% 6%

6.4 Idea about Duties and Responsibilities of UZ Chair and Vice-Chairs

Table 31 shows respondents’ idea about mandated duties and responsibilities of UZ chairman. From the table it is revealed that the proportion of awareness varies across duties and responsibilities of Chairperson of UZP. For example, while majority (74%) of the respondents in both areas are aware of two duties, such as day-to-day administrative matters and preventing crime and resolving local conflicts, they are not aware of other 10 duties that much.

Table 31: Idea about duties and responsibilities of Upazila Chairman Duties and responsibilities of Upazila Chairman Project Control Total

Have idea (%)

Have idea (%)

Have idea (%)

Day to day administrative matters 69.69 76.49 74.04 Chair all Upazila parishads meetings 37.5 48.77 44.72

Supervise all staffs 39.69 43.23 41.96

Recruit staffs and take disciplinary actions if necessary 34.8 37.63 36.62

Project preparation and implementation 35.11 36.95 36.30 Keep records of Upazila Parishad related all data 13.25 17.19 15.78

Signing contract 13.21 16.52 15.33 Issuing license and permit 24.53 31.87 29.23

Prevent crime and resolution of conflict 75.31 78.9 77.66 Any duty imposed by government 41.07 45.69 44.03

Proceed to court, if necessary 11.99 11.95 11.96 Monitoring duties of vice-chairman 49.84 53.5 52.18

Note: The rest have no idea about the activities. Table 32 reports the assessment of respondents on the activities of UZ vice-chair and woman vice-chair. More than 60% of respondents thought that vice chairmen accomplish the following mandated activities effectively: acting as chair in absence of the Chairman (86.8%), construction and maintainance of roads (72.1%), taking preventive measures against crime (55.2%), and any duties imposed by the government (66.6%). However, Vice Chairmen do not accomplish other manadated activities effectively as the proportion is lower than 50%. Similarly, according to citizens’ assessment, women vice chairs can effectively accomplish the following duties: acting as chair in absence of the Chairman (77.6%),

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ensuring health, nutrition, family planning and maternity services (56.8%), and protecting abuse of women and children (67%), and any duty imposed by the government (66%).

Table 32: Percentage of Respondents Who Think that Vice Chairman Accomplishes Responsibilities Effectively

A. Respondents who think that vice chairman accomplishes responsibilities effectively Duties and Responsibilities Project Control Total Chair of the steering committees 41.53 43.08 42.58 Act as chair in absence of chairman 86.21 87.1 86.81 Motivate people for education expansion 39.9 53.41 49.09 Coordinating activities of educational Institutions 44.33 47.1 46.22 Construction, maintenance and repair of roads 75.13 70.85 72.14 Selection & implementation of small irrigation projects 10.06 13.58 12.46

Take preventive step to protect crime 60.33 52.98 55.22 Social plantation 11.93 14.66 13.80 Expansion of youth, sports and cultural activities 9.66 20.42 17.03 Development of agriculture and forestry 13.64 21.15 18.78 Any duty imposed by govt/chairman 60.91 69.21 66.56

B. Percentage of Respondents Who Think That Woman Vice Chairman Accomplishes Responsibilities Effectively

Chair of steering committee 34.41 41.73 39.33 Act as chair in absence of chairman 76.26 78.27 77.64Ensuring health, nutrition’s, family planning and maternity services 57.29 56.66 56.86

Develop sanitation and drainage systems 42.71 45.54 44.63 Improve conditions of women and children 40.74 50.5 47.37 Develop small industries 6.21 8.78 7.96 Self employment and poverty reduction 14.77 18.47 17.30 Protect abuse of children and women, dowry, polygamy etc. 65.08 67.9 67.04

Develop livestocks and fisheries 14.94 14.44 14.59 Monitoring cooperative societies and voluntary organizations activities 5.11 13.19 10.63

Social welfare 12.43 24.47 20.65 Any duty imposed by govt/chairman 60.42 67.25 65.63 In addition to seeking information on the above manadated activities of UZP chairman and vice-chairmen, information was also saught from the citizens on some other selected activities, such as whether they come to UZP office regularly, visit project sites, attend cultural programs, resolve local conflicts and celebrate national days. Among the activities, attending national day’s celebration programs and resolving local conflicts on a regular basis were mentioned by about 40% of the respondents in case of UZP chairman, while the ratio is about 20% in case of vice chairs. Regarding regular attendance in office, relatively higher proportion of respondents (about 40%) mentioned that UZ chairman is more regular in the office than vice chairs (less than 20% of respondents). However, a clear picture has not emerged here because of ignorance of majority of the respondents regarding these activities of UZ chairs and vice chairs.

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Table 33: Information on Some Selected Activities of Upazila Chairman and Vice-Chairman

A. Project Upazilas

Chairman Women vice-chair (reserved) Vice-Chairman

Regular (%)

Irre-gular (%)

Don’t Know (%)

Regular (%)

Irre-gular (%)

Don’t Know (%)

Regular (%)

Irre-gular (%)

Don’t Know (%)

Come to Upazila parishad office 35.74 4.69 59.57 14.26 11.73 74.01 20.43 6.69 72.88

Visit project sites 13.36 18.59 68.05 2.89 17.51 79.6 9.57 17.15 73.29

Attend cultural programs 19.6 17.06 63.34 11.64 12.55 75.82 14.55 14.18 71.27

Resolve conflict 47.92 10.31 41.77 15.7 14.26 70.04 23.41 17.06 59.53 Celebrate national days 41.05 4.16 54.79 24.77 6.87 68.35 27.44 9.75 62.82

A. Control Upazilas

Chairman Women vice-chairman (reserved) Vice-Chairman

Regular Irre-gular

Don’t Know Regular Irreg-

ular Don’t Know Regular Irre-

gular Don’t Know

Come to Upazila parishad office 36.62 3.76 59.62 17.4 9.87 72.74 24.32 6.13 69.55

Visit project sites 13.46 16.97 69.57 6.65 15.36 77.99 12.66 14.74 72.51

Attend cultural programs 23.22 16.11 60.67 12.87 12.96 74.17 15.89 13.53 70.57

Resolve conflict 46.55 11.57 41.88 17.27 16.73 65.92 27.42 16.74 55.84 Celebrate national days 45.00 7.11 47.88 29.74 8.98 61.28 32.7 9.24 58.06

6.5 Evaluation of activities of UZP Chairman and Vice-Chairs

Respondents’ were asked to evaluate the activities of their respective Upazila’s Chairman, Vice chairman and woman vice chair and Upazila Nirbahi Officer on a 5-point scale. Table 34 reports respondents’ evaluation of activities of UZP chairman and vice-chairmen. The average rank is estimated to be 3 for all the three, indicating that their performance is at the average level. Community leaders (KII) also rated their satisfaction on elected chairmen and vice chairs as average. The ranking does not vary across project and control upazilas. However, about 50% of the respondents did not participate in evaluation of activities of UZ chair, Vice chairs and UNO.

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Table 34: Evaluation of Activities of Upazila Chairman and Vice-Chairman Types of representative Project Control Total

Evaluation

Scores (Average)

Don’t know (%)

Evaluation Scores

(Average)

Don’t know (%)

Evaluation Scores

(Average)

Don’t know (%)

Chairman 3 24.05 3 27.46 3 25.75 Women vice-chairman 3 42.78 3 44.10 3 43.45

Vice-chairman 3 42.13 3 42.90 3 42.5 UNO 3 52.73 3 52.03 3 52.38 Note: 1.Very good, 2.Good, 3. Average, 4. Bad, 5. Very bad

6.6 Perception about MP’s Role in the Upazila

The current official role of a local MP is to act as an adviser to UZP. However, attempts were made to understand the perception of citizens on the role of MP in local level development activities. Table 35 reports various activities of local MP that were reported by local people. Only 18% of the respondents gave their opinion, while majority of the respondents either didn’t know or made no comments about the role of local MP; the reason perhaps is that the issue is politically sensitive. The only development activity of MP that is visible to citizens is the construction or repair of roads (78% mentioned of it). Other activities, as mentioned by a small proportion of respondents include develop education institutions, coordination of projects, provide relief etc.

Table 35: Activities of local MP Activities of MPs Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Construction of roads and other infrastructure 78.18 78.95 78.65Training of youth 0.91 1.75 1.42Development of women and children 2.73 1.17 1.78Create employment 10.91 5.85 7.83Give assistance or relief 2.73 2.34 2.49Work to develop law and order 10.00 4.68 6.76Coordination of projects 3.64 7.60 6.05Distribution of govt. relief 15.45 12.28 13.52Work to developed education institutions 12.73 5.26 8.19Develop agriculture 16.36 11.11 13.17Don’t know/no comments 0.91 0.00 0.36 N (No. of respondents) 110 171 281

Table 36 reports citizens’ satisfaction about the role of local MP in development activities. While about 45% of the respondents did not make any comment on the role of MP, 25% of the respondents mentioned that they are not satisfied and the same proportion said that they are less satisfied. Only a few said that they are highly satisfied with MP’s role in development activities at the Upazila level (3%).

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Table 36: Satisfaction with MPs Role on Upazila’s Development Activities

Project (%) Control (%)

Total

Highly satisfied 5.59 1.88 3.11Less satisfied 23.96 23.52 23.67Not satisfied 27.03 25.31 25.88No comments 43.42 49.28 47.34N 555 1,118 1,673

6.7 Awareness of Upazila Budget and Coordination between UP and UZP

Almost all of the respondents are not aware of Upazila budget and budget session of Upazila (Table 37). They are also not aware of Upazila by-laws. Only about 20% of the respondents mentioned that the working relationship between UNO and UZP chairman is good, although about 70% of the respondents are not aware of it. Similarly, only about 10% of the respondents mentioned that coordination between Upazila and Union Parishad is good, while about 20% of the respondents think that it is so so. However, more than 60% don’t have knowledge about the situation.

Table 37: Knowledge about UZ Budget and Budget Session

Project (%)

Control (%)

Total (% Have you ever attended Upazila budget meeting? Yes 0.37 0.18 0.24 No 99.63 99.82 99.76 Do you know what was the budget of your Upazila last year? Yes 0 0 0 No 100.00 100.00 100.00 N 546 1,109 1,655 Coordination between UP and UZPGood 9.91 10.65 10.4 So so 21.62 27.98 25.86 Bad 4.32 2.26 2.95Don’t Know 64.14 59.12 60.79Do you have idea about UZ by-laws? Yes 0.91 0.81 0.84 No 99.09 99.19 99.16 Relations between UZP chairman and UNO Good/cooperative 21.62 21.79 22.46 Bad/non-cooperative 3.96 1.03 2.04 Don’t know 74.41 63.68 69.34 N 554 1,116 1,670

6.8 Upazila Governance

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Right to Information It has been revealed from the survey results (Table 38) that only about 5% of respondents had approached UZP for some information and of them about 80% received the required information. While project area’s respondents got the information reportedly after 12 days, control area respondents received it after 7 days.

Table 38: Citizen’s Perception towards Right to Information Project (%) Control (%) Total (%)

Have you tried to get any information from UZP? Yes 3.96 5.90 5.26 No 95.86 93.92 94.56 If Yes, have you got it? (Answer: Yes) 86.36 80 81.61 After how many days you got it (average)? Yes 12 7 9 N 555 1175 1670

Citizen Charter About 95% of the respondents mentioned that citizen charter was not prepared in their respective Upazilas. Those who made positive comments, they said that they saw it in the UZP notice board (68%vs. 73%), Union Parishad (43% vs. 37%) and UZP website (3.5% vs. 2%). This finding indicates that majority of citizens are not well aware of upazila activities including its Citizen Charter.

Table 39: Citizen’s Perception towards Citizen Charter (CC) Project (%)

Control (%)

Total (%)

Whether Citizen Charter was prepared? Yes 5.05 4.93 4.97No 94.95 95.07 95.03

If yes, where have you seen CC?UZP Notice Board 68 73.01 69UP 42.8 36.5 38.7UZP Website 3.5 1.9 2.5N 555 1175 1670

Anti-corruption Strategy Majority of the respondents do not know as to whether any anti-corruption strategies were adopted at the UZP. Only about 2% respondents mentioned that certain strategies were adopted, but they could not specify it.

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Table 40: Citizen’s Perception towards Anti-corruption Strategy

Project (%)

Control (%)

Total (%)

Any strategies taken for containing corruption? Yes 1.81 2.61 2.34 No 4.15 2.96 3.36 Don’t Know 94.04 94.43 94.30 N 555 1175 1670

Respondents were asked about whether any complain box was introduced by the UZP. About 95% respondents don’t know about it. Only about 4% responded positively; and among them only 10% in control Upazilas made complain, but they did not get any proper response (Table 41).

Table 41: Introduction of Complain Box in the UZP

Project (%)

Control (%)

Total (%)

Any complain box in the UZP? Yes 4.34 3.43 3.73 No 0.54 2.07 1.56 Don’t Know 94.94 94.50 94.65 If Yes, have you ever made complain? Yes 0.0 10.00 6.06 No 100.0 85.00 90.91 Have you got any response of your complain? Yes 0 0 0 No 0 100 100

6.9 Expected Role of UZP in Local Development and Future Expectations

Table 42 reports citizen’s perception about the expected role of UZP in local development. The main role emerged from the survey is the development of roads/infrastructure (72.6% vs. 75.4%), followed by health and education (19.2% vs. 22.9%), agriculture and irrigation (15% vs. 9.5%) and electricity (13.2% vs. 11.0%). Another notable role mentioned by the respondents was to organize opinion sharing meeting (11.4% vs. 13.8%). Respondents also expect these types of service from UZP in the future.

Table 42: Expected Role of UZPs in Local Development

Project (%)

Control (%)

Total (%)

Develop roads/infrastructure 72.57 75.41 74.40 More allowances/employment 3.46 2.97 3.14 Training program for self-employment 15.77 12.59 13.72

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Improve health and education quality 19.22 22.92 21.61 Development of agriculture and irrigation 15.12 9.50 11.49 Improve law and order 4.75 4.16 4.37 Provide electricity 13.17 11.05 11.80 Maintain quality of projects 6.05 3.68 4.52 Poverty reduction 4.97 2.38 3.30 Organize opinion sharing meeting 11.45 13.78 12.95 Others 11.02 12.23 11.80 N 463 842 1,305

6.10 Expected Services from UZP

Regarding future expectations from UZP, a number of issues were raised by the respondents. Among them, the most pertinent one was the development of infrsatucture (50%), followed by development of education institutions (19.6%), health facilities (21%), improvement of electricity supply (18.8%), pure water supply (17.7%) etc. Other notable expectations were free supply of seeds and fertilizer (11.3%), scholarship for students (13.3%), poverty reduction (13.2%) etc.

Table 43: Expected services from Upazila Parishad Expected services Project (%) Control (%) Total (%) Supply fertilizer and seeds free of cost 11.33 11.32 11.32 Development of women education 2.93 3.06 3.02 Helping for self-employment 7.68 9.74 9.05 Development of educational institutions 17.55 20.69 19.63 Scholarship for education 13.71 13.17 13.35 Training for unemployed youths 0.55 1.48 1.17 Improvement of communication system 17.00 8.63 11.45 Infrastructure development 49.54 50.74 50.34 Improvement of electricity supply 23.40 16.42 18.77 Pure water supply 18.46 17.16 17.60 Improvement of law and order situation 6.22 6.86 6.65 Adequate agriculture credit 2.38 2.78 2.65 Keeping prices of essential commodities at low level 0.55 1.02 0.86 Presence of UZP officials at grass-root level 0.37 0.19 0.25 Proper distribution of khas land 0.37 0.46 0.43 Poverty reduction 18.28 10.67 13.23 Ensure basic human rights 0.00 0.09 0.06 Corruption-free upazila 2.19 0.83 1.29 Development of health facilities 16.64 23.19 20.98 Rehabilitation of natural disaster-affected people 0.91 0.37 0.55 Establish service centre 0.73 0.83 0.80N 547 1078 1625 The following are the expectations of informed citizens (KII) about UZP:

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Expectation of Respondents from UZP

• Allocation for infrastructural development should be increased • Honorarium for elected representatives has to be increased • Project selection process should be transparent. • Court should be at Upazila level. • Services of health, education and law and order need to be enhanced. • Education institutions should be set up in each village. • Honest and right candidates should be selected in order to eradicate corruptions. • Upazila should be a model of development • Government facilities should be available and access to then be easier. • Meet Demand of poor people should be met. • UZP should be transparent and accountable to people.

6.11 Opinion on strengthening UZP

Table 44 reports opinion of the respondents on how to strengthen UZP. The most cited opinion is to contain corruption and bribery (26.5%) in order to strengthen UZP. Other important suggestions include more administrative power to UZP, more budgetary allocation for UZP, participatory decision making after consultation with the people, electing honest and capable people in UZP, etc.

Table 44: Opinion on Strengthening UZP

Project (%)

Control (%)

Total (%)

Elect honest and capable person in UZP 11.44 13.27 12.60 More administrative power to UZP 11.76 15.70 14.27 More allocation in the budget 7.52 11.96 10.34 Must have to stop corruption and bribery 31.70 23.55 26.52 More accountable system 15.03 7.85 10.46 Take decision after consultation with the people 14.05 13.64 13.79

Take projects giving priority on local development 4.25 3.93 4.04

UZP chairman and UNO must have to cooperate 6.21 12.71 10.34

UZP officials have to show more cooperative attitude towards people 4.25 1.31 2.38

Re-establish court 2.29 3.18 2.85 Improve law and order situation 9.15 9.35 9.27 Must have to stop political interference 7.52 3.36 4.88 Others 16.99 17.38 17.24 N 306 535 841

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6.12 Summary

It is observed that about 60% of the citizens (respondents) of an upazila visit their respective Upazila Parishad office or town in different occasions, and, on average they visit Upazila 3 times in 3 months. Most of them usually visit Upazila Parishad in the morning time. They visit mainly for health (70%) and land (40%) purposes. Other purpose of visit included banking service (23%), local conflict resolve (about 15%), fisheries and livestock (7%), education (8%), family planning (9%), etc. Findings show that around 70% of citizens are aware of day-to-day administrative matters of the chairman, and more than 75% respondents think that preventing crime and resolving local conflicts is an important duty of the Upazila chairman. About 50% of respondents mentioned that monitoring activities of vice chairmen is one of the duties of UZ chairperson. Most of the respondents are not aware of other duties of the chairman and vice chairs as stipulated in the Upazila Manual. About one-fourth of the respondents do not know what are the activities of chairman and vice-chairmen, so they are unable to evaluate their activities. Citizen’s perception towards the role of UZP in local development is somewhat ambiguous. The main role of UZP, according to citizen, is development of roads/infrastructure, followed by provide services such as health and education, agriculture and irrigation, electricity, etc. It has been revealed from the survey that citizens should be made aware of manadated activities of Upazila Parishad and its elected representatives, which will ultimately help strengthen the Upazila system. In this regard, the UZG project may adopt some awareness building measures for citizens, which would be consistent with its project outcome of bringing more accountability and transparency in Upazila Parishad activities and strengthen democracy there.

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CHAPTER 7

STRENGTHENING OF UPAZILA PARISHAD: SOME RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS

The study takes a concerted approach to collect and analyze information on UZP governance as much as precisely. The study collects information from Upazila Parishad administration by interviewing respective officials on different issues including UZP meetings, Standing Committee meetings, Upazila budgeting and planning, etc. To understand citizen’s perception towards Upazila Parishad activities, we interviewed a representative sample of households from each Upazila. Moreover, to validate the quantitative findings, we conduct FGDs and interviewed two types of key informants, such as line department officials and informed citizens. Finally, we summarize the findings through triangulation approach. Although all line department officials claimed that they provide satisfactory services to people, majority of citizens disagreed with this claim and they rated the service level at Upazila as very bad. So there is scope of improvement of quality of services of transferred departments if they function effectively under the guidance of UZP. For this purpose, it is important to make Committees (standing) effective. Findings suggest that Committees are yet to be functional because the LDs are run mainly by the decisions of departmental committees headed by UNO or by the decisions of central government. One of the objectives of transferring these departments was to deliver pro-poor service in a more efficient and effective manner under the guidance of a democratically elected public representative, which remains largely unfulfilled. People’s representatives remain largely ignored about the decisions of line departments. Thus, more efforts and initiatives will be required from the respective Ministry as well as Line Department Officials to make Committees more functional. In this regard, it is important to delineate the relations between Committees and other departmental committees. It is recommended that Committees are made more powerful than other departmental committees and line departments should run in accordance with Committees decisions, approved by the UZP. Another area of concern is that although monthly meeting of UZP held regularly, the outcome of the meeting is not fully representative and purposeful. In many occasions, local MP influences the decisions and in some cases either both UNO and MP or MP and UZC take decision unilaterally. So, democratic environment does not fully exist in UZPs. Decisions should be made by taking cognizance of concerns of majority of Parishad members. It is observed from the findings that in almost all Upazilas, working paper and agendas before meeting are prepared, however, FGD and KII findings reveal that these were prepared very casual way without giving much thought and time on there. It has been revealed that secondary legislative instruments are available in almost all Upazilas; however, the rules and regulations are not implemented properly. A large number of UZ members and officials are ignorant about the content of legislative instruments. More training and skill development programs could be undertaken to make the Parishad members and officials more skilful on the implementation of these instruments. Budget has been prepared by 57% of project and 39% of control Upazilas as of June 2012 following the budget guidelines. However, analyzing budget figures, one may notice that the figures in many cases are not realistic and consistent with each other. Moreover, it is reported that budget sessions were organized by some of the Upazilas and some send draft budget to

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different stakeholders for comments before finalizing it. From FGDs and KII it is evident that these sessions and comments taking process were not meaningful from two points one, the sessions were not organized perfectly, and two, the comments received in most cases irrelevant and unacceptable. So, more meaningful budget sessions are needed to be organized with a view to developing an outcome-oriented budget that reflects people’s opinion and views. Suggestions on how to improve and strengthen UZP are received from UZP chairmen, vice-chairmen, informed citizens and other stakeholders. The key suggestions were to provide more resources and authority to UZP, increase of honorarium of elected representatives, increase service quality, enhance coordination between UZP officials and elected representatives, and reduce corruption and political interference in UZP activities. They also suggest re-establishing court at the Upazila level. People think that UZP should be accountable and transparent to people. Some Specific Policy and Operational Recommendations to strengthen Upazila system (short-to-medium-to long term)

• Upazilas must be transformed in line with article 59 of our constitution by ensuring the rule of people’s representatives at all administrative units. All the functionaries at the Upazila level should be brought under the direct supervision of Upazila Parishad.

• The government has so far finalized 6 rules on functioning of Upazilas out of 14 (According to Article 63(2) of the Act, 2009 (amended). This slow pace of finalizing other rules greatly hampers better functioning of Upazila Parishad. Therefore, it is recommended to finalize the rest of the rules as soon as possible for the sake of better functioning of Upazila Parishad.

• MPs’ developmental role is unconstitutional. Thus, their role should not go beyond the current advisory role to UZP

• Development role of Upazila should focus more on MDGs, rather than only on infrastructure development

• Efforts should be made for effective transfer of departments by disbanding parallel bodies such as departmental committees, or bring those departmental committees under the direct supervision of (standing) committees

• Expenditures and revenues of line departments should be integrated to Upazila budget • Capacity building should continue in different areas. It is necessary to build capacity

of elected representatives by making them aware of laws, rules and guidelines etc. For day to day functioning, it is necessary to provide representatives with hands-on training to hold meetings, write minutes and working papers. Moreover, capacity building for technical work, such as budget preparation, plan preparation, e-governance will be necessary

• Capacity building of M&E and MIS section of LGD is important in order to maintain an effective and sustainable monitoring and evaluation system of local government. Necessary technical and skillful personnel must be appointed there to revitalize the system.

• A national framework for local government capacity development can be developed, which will be instrumental for local government development.

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• Local government offices at the divisional and district level should be equipped with a sustainable system of monitoring and backstopping local governments.

• As a long term objectives, policies should be undertaken in such a way that UZP can be made autonomous without the control of respective ministry/ministries.

Some strategic recommendations First, activating Committees (Standing) properly are central to linking local level governance with local level development outcomes. An effective Committee can ensure accountability and transparency in public service delivery of line departments, which, in turn, is expected to enhance pro-poor and MDG targeted development outcomes of Upazilas. Second, making five year development plan properly will have significant bearing in rejuvenating developmental activities at the Upazila level. In course of time, local level five year plans and annual budgets based on such Plan can be integrated to national five year Plan and national budget, which will make local government decentralization process more meaningful and lead to more inclusive development. Third, to make the Parishad meetings more purposeful and to reduce undue influence in decision making process from different quarters, under the Upazila Act 1998, Article 28, a mechanism for greater mandatory institutional interaction could be devised between local governments (Upazila Parishad) and CBOs/ NGOs available locally to ensure transparency in local project selection, increased revenue mobilization, support to local level needs, and improved monitoring. Fourth, another potential area of intervention in improving local governance is to ensure e-governance at the Upazila level. Updated Upazila’s websites and use of ICTs in Upazila activities could open up the avenue of ensuring e-governance. E-governance entails the possibility of multi-directional interactions—people to people, government to government, people to government, government to people, business to government and government to business contact through the medium of ICT. Finally, indicators are central to any impact assessment. As measuring devices, they define what data to collect and at what time intervals. Impact assessments can start the process of answering if and how improvement of Upazila governance produces benefits to the individuals and communities. It is clear that impact measurement of UZGP, like most development projects, is highly contextual – and thus hard to quantify many of the aspects. Clearly, even defining success is highly contestable. The indicators measured in this study, some of those are redefined, may be traceable after a certain period of time, say 2-3 years later, if the project is properly implemented. Thus, an evaluation of some indicators may be needed in mid-course of the project by taking a sub-sample of baseline sample. Suggestions on UZGP Project Evaluation Methodology There are various econometric techniques that can be applied for impact evaluation. A subset of baseline sample can be randomly selected for impact evaluation. Some of the techniques for subsequent impact evaluation are suggested below. Difference-in-Difference Techniques: A central feature of impact evaluation is the use of

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longitudinal data (repeated observations of the same individuals or households over time) to use “difference-in-differences” or “double difference” methods. These methods rely on baseline data collected before the project is implemented and follow-up data collected after the project is fully operational for a sufficient period of time to generate impact or after the completion of the project, to develop a “before/after” comparison. These data are collected from households receiving the program and those that do not (“with or without the program”).

To ensure that evaluation is not adversely affected by such a possibility, it is necessary to know what these indicators would have looked like if the program had not been implemented—one needs a second dimension to evaluation design that includes data on Upazilas/households “with” and “without” the program. The fundamental problem, of course, is that an individual, household, or a geographic area cannot simultaneously undergo and not undergo an intervention. Therefore, as part of the evaluation, it is necessary to construct a counterfactual measure of what would have happened if the program had not been available, and this is why we also need the “with/without” comparison. For assessing impact evaluation of UZGP project in terms of its social and economic impact, this type of analysis is very important.

Propensity Score Matching (PSM): Another technique is to use PSM technique. Credible assessments of program impact on welfare require that program beneficiaries (the “treatment” group) are as comparable as possible to those not receiving benefits from the program (the “comparison” group). The PSM method of program evaluation constructs a control or comparison group by “matching” treatment households to comparison group households based on observable characteristics. The impact of the program is then estimated as the average difference in the outcomes for each treatment household from a weighted average of outcomes in each similar comparison group of household from the matched sample.

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REFERENCES

Ahmed, N., Ahmed, T., Faizulah, Md. (2010) Working of Upazila Parishad in Bangladesh: A Study of Twelve Upazilas, UNDP Hossain, Monzur, Sen, B. (2011) “Assessment of Performance of Union Facilitation Team (UFT) in LGSP-LIC Union Parishads” (Local govt units), December-January, 2011-12, BIDS Study, Unpublished Karim, M. A. Upazila System in Bangladesh,(Dhaka, NILG, 1991) Mozumder, A. K. and Haque, M. A. A Study of the Savar Upazila Parishad: Legal Mandate and Reality (Final Report) (Dhaka, UNDP, 2010). Selim, M. and Ahmed, S. Working of Upazila System: A Case Study of umarkhali Upazila (Final Report) (Dhaka, UNDP, 2010) Sen, Binayak, Hossain, M. and Chowdhury, T.T. (2011). Impact Assessment of Supplementary Block Grants provided to Union Parishads (Local govt units) under LGSP-LIC”, December-February, 2011-12, BIDS Study, Unpublished Upazila Five Year Plan, Chouddagram Upazila Parishad Upazila Five Year Plan, Brahman Para Upazila Parishad Upazila Five Year Plan, Akelpur Upazila Parishad Upazila Parishad Manual, 2010, Local Government, Rural Development and Cooperative Ministry Various Circulars, Local Government, Rural Development and Cooperative Ministry

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APPENDIXES: APPENDIX-I Name of Enumerators Table: List of Field Supervisors and Field Officers SL No.

Name of FS & FO Position

1. Md. Rezaul Karim (Real) Field Supervisor 2. Md. Azharul Islam Khan Field Supervisor 3. Md. Shah Md. Mamunur Rashid Field Supervisor 4. Shakhwat Hossain Field Supervisor 5. Abdul Hye Field Supervisor 6. Md. Faizul Hoque Field Officer 7. Iftekhar (Sohel) Field Officer 8. Fazlul Hoque Field Officer 9. Kamruzzaman Field Officer 10. Md. Manzurul Haque Field Officer 11. Md. Musa Baker Field Officer 12. Md. Kamal Uddin Field Officer 13. Enamul Hoque Field Officer 14. Md. Moklasur Rahman Field Officer 15. Md. Emdadul Huq Field Officer 16. Sharif Mostafa Ahkam Field Officer 17. Md. Mizanur Rahman (1) Field Officer 18. Md. Abdul Rashid Field Officer 19. Md. Mizanur Rahman (2) Field Officer 20. Nazmun Nahar Field Officer 21. Fouzia Field Officer 22. Dilara Field Officer 23. Selly Sultana Field Officer 24. Shamim ara mita Field Officer 25. Doulot Ara Field Officer

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APPENDIX-II Sample Upazilas

Table A1: List of sample Upazilas, Unions and Villages District Upazila Union Village** Jamalpur

Baksiganj Bagar Char Mondol Para (100) Merur Char Awal Para (136)

Islampur Char Goalini Amdanga part (226)

Kulkandi Akanda Para (102) Kishoreganj Kishoreganj

Sadar Mahinanda Kotsholakia (132) Maij Khapan Patuakandi (104)

Mithamain Methamain Maizer Kandi (100) Dhaki Santipur (117)

Shariatpur

Bhedarganj Ramvadropur Mahishkandi (223) Char Kumaria Rahim Beparikandi (105)

Zanjira Sener Char Mollahkandi (136) Bara Krisnanagar Sadar Ali Madbarkandi (104)

Natore

Singra Hatiandaha Tarapur (74) Chaugram Beigharia (81)

Lalpur Changdhupail Laskarpur (60) Ishwardi Bhat para (224)

Pabna

Ishardi Muladuli Ramnathpur (120) Lakshmikundi Bilkedar Bjeaptilakheraj (120)

Sujanagar Raninagar

Botal (105)

Tantibanda Funal Dulia (127) Sirajgonj

Kazipur Gandail Purba Khuiksia ((100) Sonamukhi Tatuahata (195)

Ullahpara Pancha Krushi Manirpur (140) Salap Haribhanga (146)

Dinajpur

Phulbari Upazila,

Betdighi Dakshin Raghunathpur (107)

Khayerbari Kismat lalpur (157) Birgonj Upazila Shatagram Nohail (138)

Sujalpur Bhaduria (104) Panchagarh

Debigonj Tepriganj Upanchauki Bhajni 12 (93) Hazradanga Kismat Bagdaha (118)

Tentulia Banglabandha Jharua Para (192) Tirnaihat Thunthunia (134)

Rangpur

Pirgachha Anandanagar Chand Chaudhuri (100) Pirgachha Naohati (162)

Pirganj Pirganj Arjipur (161) Kabilpur Chhota Kuya (107)

Barguna

Barguna Sadar Keorabunia K. Latabaria (109) Naltona Shialia (136)

Betagi Betagi Uttar Betagi Kazirabad Uttar Kalikabari

Barisal

Bakerganj Upazila

Padri shibpur Purba Maheshpur (163) Charadi Makimabad

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Hijla Guabaria Bazit Khan (90) Dhulkhola Basu Patti (73)

Bhola

Doulatkhan Madanpur Char Munshi (59) Saidpur Dakshin Sadipur (80)

Tazumuddin Bara Malancha Mahadevpur (43) Chanchra Pathar Char (60)

Brahmanbaria

Bancharampur Rupasdi Khaorpur (120) Ujan Char Natunhati (100)

Brahmanbaria Sadar

Uttar Natai Tale Para (116)

Sultanpur Jhokarpar (97)

Comilla

Debidwar Jafarganj Dakshin Narayanpur(138) Rasulpur Noakandi (108)

Choudhagram Kankapait Agansail (97) Gunabati Narayanpur (102)

Cox's Bazar

Moheskhali Bara Maheskhali Sugripara (138)

Matarbari Bandi Sikdar para (142) Teknaf Baharchhara Kachapia (115)

Teknaf union Dargachhara (114) Habiganj

Bahubal Bahubal Kabirpur (108) Mirpur Union Chandrachari (108)

Nabigonj Gazanpur Anwarpur Sonaru (61) Kargaon Kamalpur (122)

Maulvibazar

Srimongal Bhunabir Patrikul Digar (119) Sindurkhan Nolarpar (85)

Kulaura Kadirpur Kiatala (98) Karmadha Bahattia (88)

Sunamganj Jagannathpur Mirpur union Pailbagh (66) Pailgaon Alagadi puran (60)

Sullah Habibpur Narikila (100) Sullah union Kadirpur (100)

Khulna Dacope Dacope Singjora (97) Kamarkhola Channir Chak (144)

Dumuria Dhamalia Mujar Ghuta (45) Kharnia Singa (66)

Magura

Shalikha Upazila Shalikha Shalikha (80) Shatakhali Kholabari (86)

Sreepur Upazila, Magura

Nakol Union Madhupur (96) Sreekol Radhakantapur (77)

Satkhira District

Shyamnagor Ishwaripur Gutlikati (120) Kashimari Achharyan Proelopo (99)

Kaliganj Upazila

Krishnanagar Chowdhury Hat (105) Nalta union Durduria (107)

21 42 ** Number of household in each village. Source: BBS. Project Upazilas are shown as yellow-colored.

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APPENDIX-II

ADDITIONAL TABLES AND FIGURES

Table 45: Profile of respondents of Upazila Module Project Control Total

Upazila chairman 57.14 71.43 66.67 Vice chairman 71.43 46.43 54.76 Women vice chairman 50.00 71.43 64.29 UNO 78.57 82.14 80.95 Accountants assistant 7.14 3.57 4.76 Office assistant 42.86 39.29 40.48 Line department officials 57.14 71.43 66.67

Table 46: Respondents profile under qualitative study. SL.N Type of Respondents Number A KII (Key informant Interviews) 297 A.1 GO officials 118 1. Officers of 16 transferred departments 114 2. Officers of 3 retained departments 04 A.2 Village People 179 1. UP members 41 2. Businessmen 34 3. Political leaders 25 4. Teachers 46 5. NGO representatives 18 6. Bankers 02 7. Ex-GO officers 04 8. Journalists 05 B FGD (Focus group discussion) 21 1. Chairman of UZP 14 2. Vice Chairman of UZP 14 3. Vice Chairman (Female) of UZP 13 4. UP Chairman 74 5. UNO 13 6. Other (Mayor, Upazila Engineer) 02

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Table 47: Profile of KII Respondents—Government Officials SL.N Departments Number of KII 1 Public Administration 04 2 Fisheries Development 10 3 Livestock Development 02 4 Agriculture Development 12 5 Youth Development 05 6 Women affairs 15 7 Social Welfare 08 8 Health and Family planning 03 9 Primary Education 20 10 Upazila Local Gov. Engineering 16 11 Rural Development Office 07 12 Cooperative Office 08 13 Project Implementation Officer 02 14 Environment and Forest 02 16 Accounts 01 17 Statistics 01 18 Assistant Commissioner (land) 02 Total 118

Table 48: Distribution of Upazilas according to Formation Status of (Standing) Committees

Project Project Control As of June 30, 2012 5 (35.7%) 21 (75.0%) July-November, 2012 9 (64.3%) 3 (10.7%) Not yet formed 0 4 (14.3%) Total 14 (100%) 28 (100%)

Table 49: Availability of UZP Officials Yes No At Times Upazila chairman Morning 15.07 17.99 13.99Noon 18.01 15.01 10.14Afternoon 23.62 15.17 15.18Vice-chairman Morning 8.76 16.48 16.03Noon 13.37 9.34 23.91Afternoon 15.75 10.47 15.71Women vice-chairman Morning 5.5 15.15 16.62Noon 8.87 7.34 25.36Afternoon 7.87 8.25 13.09UNO Morning 10.05 5.11 6.41

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Noon 9.82 8.67 2.9Afternoon 9.45 8.4 12.04Uazila health officer Morning 23.97 15.15 22.45Noon 15.83 24.87 13.04Afternoon 25.2 22.4 16.75AC land Morning 11.82 9.09 12.24Noon 8.05 12.86 6.52Afternoon 6.3 12.09 4.71Social Welfare Office Morning 3.54 3.41 3.21Noon 3.96 3.29 3.62Afternoon 1.57 3.46 4.71Upazila engineers Morning 2.73 2.65 2.04Noon 2.86 2.62 2.17Afternoon 1.57 2.6 4.19Upazila agricultural Officer Morning 6.32 5.3 2.92Noon 8.19 4.95 5.8Afternoon 3.94 5.72 7.85Upazila cooperative officer Morning 2.34 2.08 1.75Noon 2.59 2.19 0.72Afternoon 1.57 2.3 1.57Rural development officer Morning 2.25 1.89 1.17Noon 2.59 1.95 0.72Afternoon 1.57 2.03 2.62Project implementation Officer Morning 2.25 2.27 0.58Noon 2.73 1.81 2.17Afternoon 0.79 2.15 1.05

Table 50: Expected Services from UZPs

Project (%)

Control (%)

Supply free seeds and fertilizer 5.29 5.67 Develop women education 1.39 1.53 Create self-employment opportunity 3.64 4.88 Develop education institutions 8.33 10.32 Provide scholarships 6.5 6.6 Develop roads infrastructures 31.12 29.70 Improve electricity condition 11.1 8.23

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Supply of pure water 8.76 8.55 Improve law and order situation 2.95 3.44 Poverty reduction 8.67 5.35 Improve health facilities 7.89 11.58

Table 51: Functions and Role and Responsibilities of UZP, Chairs and Vice-Chairs as the Opinion of Community Respondents.

UZP UZC UZVC UZVC (Female) - Infrastructural development. -Project selection and implementation. - Project site visit - Coordination between UZP and UP. - Village development - Solving of peoples ‘problem

- Conflict resolution -Coordinating government officers -Scheme implementation - Maintenance of law & order - Construct roads and bridge - Improve education -Sign contract - Coordinating among UPs - Maintenance of road

- Scheme supervision -Liaison with government officers -All jobs of UZC in his absence - Attend office regularly

- Scheme supervision -Liaison with government officers -All jobs of UZC in his absence - Attend office regularly

Table 52 : Merits of UZP, Challenges and Suggestions Merits Challenges Suggestions

• Easy to solve any problem • Local problem can be

solved locally • No need to go at Zila level

for tendering • Easy to meet with UZC • Services are now very

closed to people • Increasing people

engagement with local government

• Less people’s participation • Less scheme

implementation • Less oriented with local

people • Conflicts between UZC and

UNO • Political interference • Corruption

• UZP leaders and govt. officials should be honest

• Deliver more power and resource to UZP

• All should work together. • Do the job at right time. • Proper utilization of

government resources. • UZP leaders should do

their job fairly • Political interference

should be stopped • UZP system was better in

Ershad regime.

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Table 53: Summary of FGD and KII findings FGD (UZP Chairman, Vice chairs and

members) KII (Line Department officials) KII (Citizens) Summary/ Comments

UZP Activities/Civic Amenities

-There is no specific job description or work list of the members of UZP, especially the posts of vice chairs. In some cases, vice chairs do not get any official notice or letter also. -They think that their power and authority is very limited in the Upazila.

- UNO has power to control over line departments.

-The local MP who is an advisor to the UZP, has also more authority and power to control everything

-The members of UZP have no freedom to do anything without permission of UNO or MP.

- In some cases, UNO and UZC jointly play dominating role.

-The UZP do not get necessary allocation. The allocation that UZP gets, cannot be used independently by UZC or UZVCs.

-There is unfair interference of MP as well as interference of ruling party followers.

--A good number of citizens make visit to these departments in order to receive services in every day. The number varies from 4 to 100 persons per day in respect of departments. --The GO officials thought that most of the service recipients are satisfied with their services.

--Regarding satisfaction with the current activities of UZP, 50% respondents expressed satisfaction, 44% dissatisfaction and the rest had no opinion. -- Community leaders rated their satisfaction on elected chairmen and vice chairs as average. Advantages: • Local problem can be solved

locally; No need to go at Zila level for tendering

• Easy to meet with UZC • Services are now very closed

to people • Increase people engagement

with local government Challenges: • Less people’s participation • Less scheme implementation • Less oriented with local

people • Conflicts between UZC and

UNO • Political interference;

Corruption

--Less authority to UZP. Local MP and UNO dominate. There are conflicts between UZC and UNO in many issues, which were mentioned by citizens. --Although line department officials claimed that they provide satisfactory services, 50% of KII citizens do not agree with this.

Legislative instruments -There are many laws, rules and circulars

regarding UZP, which of them important for the activating of UZP. But these are not

--Although legislative instruments are available, they are not implemented

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FGD (UZP Chairman, Vice chairs and members)

KII (Line Department officials) KII (Citizens) Summary/ Comments

executed properly at the field level.

properly.

UZP Meetings -- The UZPs have arranged meetings more or less on a regular basis. On average, 85% of UZP has met at least once a month over the last one year.

--The respondents of FGD reported that generally in consultation with UZC, UNO office prepares the notice including agenda along with working paper and serves it to all members and actors of UZP a certain days-some are one week or some 2/3 days- earlier before the meeting date. And end of the meeting, the minutes of the meeting are prepared and served to all.

--The 58% respondents reported that local MP or his/her representatives and their fellows regularly attend in meeting of their UZP and take active part in its proceedings. They often dominate the discussion and heavily influence the process of decision making.

--It is also found that MPs in 24% of UZPs have never attended in any of the UZP meetings. In some cases, MP does not attend in regular meeting, but on request of him, the UZP had to arrange special meeting, where s/he attends.

--Most of the respondents mentioned that all elected representatives and officials of Upazila departments, who are in meeting, are active in the discussion.

--In most cases, decisions in the meeting are taken with the consent of all members and

--UZP meetings held regularly and working paper and minutes of the meetings are also prepared. Prior notice of the meeting is served by the UNO office a week before, and in some cases 2-3 days before the meeting. --Local MP dominates decision making process --All participants including women can actively participate in the meeting although women representation is poor.

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they did not use vote for decision making.

--Women do not have adequate representation in UZP. Because women members have not been elected as yet. --It is revealed that besides the women vice chairs, maximum 3 other women were present in the sample UZP meetings. About 50% of FGD respondents reported that women participation in discussion is good. They can put their opinion freely in the meeting.

Standing Committee Meetings

-Most of the SCs have not hold a meeting yet.

-Most of the respondents said that the SCs could not play active role in carrying out the programs of UZP

- the lack of initiatives from government departments is the main reason for ineffectiveness of SCs

-most of the departments have their own standing committee. -about 80% standing committees have yet not hold a meeting, -Most of the respondents said that the standing committees could not play active role in carrying out the departmental programs. -There are several reasons behind not activating the standing committees, which are lack of interest of elected representatives to hold meeting, decisions of standing committees have not implemented etc. -Almost all respondents told that every department has one or more other committees out of the standing committee in order to take and implement decisions regarding mostly departmental development related activities, which are generally headed by UNO.

--Most of the SCs meetings were not held regularly. UZP members claimed that SCs are not effective because departments are run by their own committees. This was also agreed by Line Department officials. --On the other hand, Line Department officials claimed that elected representatives are not interested to hold SCs. They are also concerned about politicization in the decision making process of SCs.

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-They mentioned that the decisions taken by own departmental committee gets more priority rather the standing committee.

Transferred Departments -The transferred departments in general

mostly work through their own departmental committees. Every department has one or more other committees in addition to the standing committee, which are generally headed by UNO.

--A large majority of the FGD respondents expressed that most of the officials of transferred department are available in their office regularly in the morning, but they are not in office in the afternoon in many cases.

--The officers who have government residence, they stay there.

-The line departments are not transferred effectively. As a result, UZP has no information about how transferred departments carry out their functions.

--Transferred departments are not effective perfectly and everything of transferred departments is carried out as was in the past. Concerns: • Political interference will

increase • Misuse of power will happen • Conflict between UNO and

UZC can undermine the work performance

• Decisions can be prolonged • Activities will control by

chairman and his/her muscle-men

• Corruption can be increased • No significant role of the

standing committees • Conflict between officers of

line department and UZC will be created for getting undue privilege

• Conflicts between departmental committee and standing committee will undermine the work environment.

--Transferred departments are not working under the guidance of UZPs—they are run by their usual way. --UZP has no control over Line Department (LD) Officials. --Most of the LD officials remain available in the morning, but not in the afternoon. So, people do not get their service in the afternoon.

Coordination between elected representatives

--About 48% of respondents of FGD expressed that the coordination between UZP and the officials is good, however, 41%

--Still coordination problem persists between UZC and UNO in many

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and govt officials respondents said not good and the rest has no comments. --Moreover, they mentioned that there are various reasons for the lack of coordination, such as interference of MP, not having enough power regarding disciplinary action, for not following the decisions of UZP, etc. --They also expressed that the government should take initiative to improve the relation between UZP and officials of transferred department. In this case, all departments should be transferred effectively to the UZP. --According to the finding of FGD, except one sample UZP, there is no problem in coordination between UZP and UP.

cases. One of the reasons for lack of coordination is the interference of local MP as he often tries to do something with the help of UNO bypassing UZC.

Budgeting and planning

--A good number of the sample UZPs have prepared its budget for 2012-2013 for the first time. --The UZP budget is prepared with participation of officials of the line departments and mostly passed it in the UZP meeting with the consent of all members of UZP. --It is noted that six Upazilas out of 21 Upazilas (28.5%), have arranged open budget meeting for sharing. --Aall FGD respondents reported that they have not yet prepared any five year plan. --A few Upazilas have prepared only annual plan with the participation of all members of respective UZP. --The reasons for not preparing five year plan are lack of proper guideline for preparing

--Most of the respondents expressed that they have heard about UZP budget. But there was no allocation for their department separately. --A very few respondents told that they were informed regarding allocation for their departments in UZP budget. --In addition, all respondents said that they have got allocation from their line ministry in each year to carry out their programs.

--Most of the respondents expressed that they are not informed about the five year plan or annual plan of UZP.

--A very few respondents told that there are five year plan in their UZPs.

--More than 80% respondents expressed ignorance about any budget of their UZP. A very few respondents said of knowing budget of their respective Upazila. They were informed by a letter by UZP but did not participate in the process.

--A good number of UZP has so far prepared annual budget of Upazila, but citizens are largely unaware of it. --Line department budgets were not integrated as reported by LD officials. --No five year or annual plan was prepared in sample Upazilas.

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plan, lack of resources, lack of technical assistance, lack of person power etc. --They said all projects/schemes were selected and implemented following the respective government rules and circular. FGD respondents expressed that UP Chairman prepares list of schemes, and placed the list to Upazila meeting. In many cases, considering benefit of maximum number of people, the project were selected and implemented.

--KII respondents of community expressed that projects/schemes are prepared in most cases by the suggestions of either MP or UNO and in some cases by UZP and other government officials.

--Regarding project, more than 50% of respondents did not take part in the process of project selection, some said positively of having opportunity to take part in scheme selection.

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APPENDIX-III

Baseline Survey Questionnaire for UZGP

Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS)

E-17, Agargoan, Dhaka - 1207

Baseline Study for UZGP project - 2012 Module for Upazila Parishad Information

Name of Upazila Parishad--------------------------------------------------

Type of Upazila Parishad : 1. Treatment 2. Control

District:----------------------------------------------------------------------- ---

1) Name and designation of information providers:

Sl.No Name Sex 1.Male 2. Female

Age (year)

Designation Mobile No

1. Upazila Chairman

2. Vice -Chairman

3. Women Vice Chairman (Reserved)

4. UNO5. 6. 7.

Date of Data Collection ---------/---------/----------

Section 1: Profile of the Upazila

1.1. Under which program was this Upazila previously?

1. LGSP

2. LGSP-LIC

3. None of this

1.2. Area of this Upazila currently (Sq.km.) ÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑ

1.3. Number of Union Parishads in this Upazila.....................

1.4. Number of Pouroshava in this Upazila..............................

1.5. Number of running projects in this Upazila......................

1.6. Status of Assets of the Upazila

Number / Amount A. Physical Resources

ID

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7| Provision and maintenance of drainage

8| Provision and maintenance of graveyards and burning places

9| Checking adulteration of food products

10| Maintenance of educational institutions

11| Provision of flood and famine relief

12| Establishment of welfare homes, orphanages

13| Organization of social welfare

14| Establishment of public dispensaries

15| Provision of public urinals and latrines

16| Establishment of veterinary hospitals

17| Establishment of registration of cattle sale

18| Establishment of improvement of livestock

19| Celebration of national holidays

20| Recreation of distinguished visitors

21| Establishment of public libraries and reading rooms

22| Promotion of community development schemes

Section 2: Upazila Parishad Law /Manual / By-Laws 2.1. Which of the required secondary legislation instruments are available in Upazila Parishad?

1. Upazila Parishad Manual 2. UP operational manual 3. Guideline for budget preparation 4. Guideline for preparation of five year plan 5. Guideline for preparation of annual plan 6. RTI Act 7. Tendering guideline 8. Guideline for procurement 9. Planning book 10. Others (please specify)-------------------

2.2. Whether the Upazila has bye-laws? 1. Yes 2. No

(If yes, collect the copy of table of contents and some other important pages of that)

2.3. If no, what are the reasons? 1. 2. 3. 4. Section 3: Standing Committee and effectiveness

3.1. Has any standing committee been formed? 1. Yes 2. No

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4.1. If yes, please provide information about the following committee Sl. No

Name of Committee Whether formed 1. Yes 2. No

If yes, in which date it was formed?

How many meeting was held during the last one year (2010-11)

How many decisions were taken during the last one year? (2010-11)

How many decisions were implemented?

Identity of the chairperson of the committees (1.Male, 2.Female)

How many members are in the committee? (number)

How many female members are in the committee? (number)

1. Law and peace 2. Communication and infrastructure

development

3. Agriculture and irrigation 4. Secondary and madrasha education 5. Primary and mass education 6. Health and family welfare 7. Youth and sports 8. Women and children development 9. Social welfare 10. Freedom fighter 11. Fisheries and livestock 12. Rural development and cooperative 13. Culture 14. Forest and environment 15. Observation, monitoring and controlling of

market price

16. Finance, budget, planning and mobilization of local resources

17. Public health, sanitation and supply of safe drainage water

18. Others (Please specify)-----------------

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Section 4: Citizens’ Charter / Anti-corruption strategy 4.1. Has the Upazila a citizen’s Charter? 1. Yes 2. No 4.2. If no, what are the reasons?

1. Has not prepared yet. 2. Has not given importantance 3. Don’t think necessary /not need 4. Under preparation /process 5. Others (Please specify) ------------------------

4.3. Has the Upazila Parishad prepared a citizens’ Charter incorporating arrangements for Upazila Parishad

(UZP) constituent relations? Yes 2. No 4.3. What are the ways to get citizens’ charter?

1. Union Parishad (UP) 2. Upazila Parishad Office

3. Upazila Parishad Website 4. Office of Pourasava

5. Others (Please specify) ------------------------

4.4. Has there any anti-corruption strategy or action plan? Yes 2. No

4.5. If yes, what are those strategies?

1. Citizens’ Charter 2. Open budget system 3. Opinion sharing meeting 4. Internal Auditing 5. Following public procurement rules 6. Visiting and evaluating project sites 7. Arrange hearing of corruption. 8. Box has been arranged for submitting the complains against corruption. 9. Others (Please specify) ------------------------ 4.7. If no, what are the reasons? 1. This is not the responsibility of Upazila Parishad (UZP) 2. No such instructions from the higher authority 3. Others (Please specify) ------------------------ Section 5: Budget 5.1. Does the Upazila Parishad (UZP) prepare budget every year? 1. Yes 2. No 5.2. If no, what are the reasons?

1. Lack of skilled manpower to prepare budget 2. Lack of required resources for prepare budget 3. No instruction from higher authority 4. Others (Please specify) ------------------------

5.3. Were the procedures properly followed in preparing budget? 1. Yes 2. No

5.4. If yes, what are the procedures followed by? 1| Send the draft copy of budget to the concerned MP each union parishad, Pourashava, local press

club etc. 2| Publish the planning documents and draft of budget in the own website of Upazila Parishad. 3| Discuss the planning and budget with all the UP members, pourashava councilors, head of the

educational institutes, private organizations, bank, private entrepreneurs, and civil society.

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4| Finalized the budget following the discussion

5.5. If no, what are the reasons? 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

5.6. If yes (# of question5.1), who does prepare the budget? 1. 2. 3. 4.

5.7. Have they previous experience /training on this? 1. Yes 2. No 5.8. If yes, who have provided training?

1. NILG 2. ADC (Revenue ) office 3. Divisional Commissioners office 4. NGO Officials 5. Others (Please specify) ------------------------

5.9. For how many days were the training?--------------- Days 5.10. If no, what type of training is needed?

1. On budget preparation 2. On accounting 3. On government policies regarding preparation of budget 4. Others (Please specify) ------------------------

5.11. Do you think the appointment of some skilled person or persons is / are required to prepare budget? 1. Yes 2. No

5.12. Has the budget session been held? 1. Yes 2. No

5.13. If yes, how many members participated? --------------------- 5.14. Who did participate in the budget session?

1. 2. 3. 4.

Information regarding Upazila budget

5.15. Budget

Part Sl. No

Description Budget for 2010-11 Proposed budget for 2011-12

Part-1 (Revenue)

1 Received 2 Revenue 3 Grant 4 Total receipt (A) 5 Additional revenue

expenditure

6 Revenue surplus /deficit

Part-2 (Development

account)

1 Development grant 2 Others grants/revenue surplus 3 Total B 4 Total assets received (A+B) 5 Minus development

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expenditure 6 Total budget surplus /deficit 7 Plus initial balance 8 Total budget balance

Revenue mobilization and Expenditure 5.16. Income sources of Upazila Parishad (UPZ)

Sl. No Name of Heads 2010-11 2011-12 1 Income from house rent of UPZ parishad 2 Income from haat-bazar, transferred water

bodies and farryghat

3 Tax from trade, business center, factory and industry

4 Tax from cinema 5 Tax from theatre, games and traditional

cultural activities

6 Tax from road lighting 7 Tax from fair, exhibition and recreational

activities

8 Tax from trade license issued by UZP 9 Registration fees (1%) 10 1% tax from land transfer 11 2% land development tax 12 Previous balance 13 Total

5.17. Expenditure of Upazila Parishad

Sl No Name of Head 2010-11 2011-12 1 Honorarium /allowance /salary (Chairman,

vice-chairman and staff of Upazila Parishad)

2 Conveyance (Chairman and vice-chairman) 3 Stationery

4 House rent of chairman 5 Provident fund (50% of salary of UP staff)6 Vehicle maintenance and fuel 7 Expenses for tax collection 8 Utilities bill (phone, electricity, gas, water) 9 Expenses of internal audit 10 Expenses of entertainment 11 Operation and maintenance service charge12 Office and residential building repairing13 Furniture and equipment 14 Other payable bill 15 Relevant expenses 16 Printing of forms and money receipt, etc.) 17 Tree plantation and guarding 18 Donation to social and religious organization 19 Donation to clubs under the area of Upazila

Parishad

20 Celebrating national days 21 Sports and culture 22 Emergency relief / unwanted expenditure 23 Haat-bazar and development projects

maintenance cost

24 Capital cost

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25 Construction of boundary wall 26 Vehicle purchase 27 Furniture purchase 28 Revenue surplus transferred of development

account

29 Previous balance 30 Total expenditure (revenue account)

5.18. Income of development fund

Sl No. Head of income 2010-11 2011-12

1 Grant (Development)

2 Other source (has to be specify)

3 Repairing of Upazila Parishad building

4 Voluntarily donate

5 Surplus revenue of previous year

6 Total receipt (Development Account)

5.19. Whether the line departments have been integrated with the last year budget? 1. Yes 2. No

5.20. If yes, please provide the allocation of the line departments

Sl No. Line Department Expenditure of Development budget (Tk.)

2010-11 2011-12 1. Law and peace/order 2. Communication and infrastructure development 3. Agriculture and irrigation 4. Secondary and madrasa education 5. Primary and mass education 6. Health and family welfare 7. Youth and sports 8. Women and children development 9. Social welfare 10. Freedom fighter 11. Fisheries and livestock 12. Rural development and cooperative 13. Culture 14. Forest and environment 15. Observation, maintaining and controlling of market price 16. Finance budget, planning and mobilization 17. Public health, sanitation and supply of safe drinking water 18. Others (please specify) ------------- 19. Total Expenditure (Development account)

5.21. Whether the Upazila Parishad has any own fund? 1. Yes 2. No

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5.22. If yes, what is the amount? --------------------- Tk.

5.23. Whether MDGs have given the priority in the budget 1. Yes 2. No 5.24. If yes, what is the allocation of MDGs, please describe.

Sl. No MDGs Budget allocation (2010-12) Tk.

1. Eradication of hungry and extreme poverty

2. Universal primary education

3. Women empowerment and equality between male and female

4. Reduction of infant and maternal mortality

5. Development of maternal health

6. Combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other disease

7. Sustainable development

8. Global partnership for development

Section 6: Development Planning A. Annual Development Planning

6.1. Whether there is any annual development plan 1. Yes, 2. No 6.2. If no, what are the reasons?

1. 2. 3.

6.3. Does the Upazila Parishad have development plan and budgeting guideline? 1. Yes, 2. No 6.4. Were the officials given training on planning and budgeting guideline? 1. Yes, 2. No

6.5. If yes, who gave the training?

1. NILG 2. ADC (Revenue ) 3. Divisional Commissioners office. 4. NGO staffs 5. Others (Please specify) ---------------------------

6.6. Information on Annual Development Program (ADP) related projects in the Financial Year 2011-

12 Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)

No of projects

Allocation for projects

Project implementa-tion period

Whether the projects completed in time 1| Yes, 2| No

Whether the fund disbursed duly 1| Yes, 2| No

How the projects were selected? (code)

Whether any project remains in completed? 1| Yes, 2| No

Reasons for incompletion

Number of benefited Union Parishads



3. Women

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empowerment and equality between male and female



6. Combating HIV / AIDS, malaria and other disease

7. Sustainable Development


Project selection Code: 1. Through meeting, 2. According to the public opinion, 3. As per the demand of chairman, 4. As per the demand of members, 5. According to the opinion of influential persons of the locality, 6. According to the opinion of MP, 7. Others (please specify) -----------

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B. Five Year Plan

6.7. Whether five year plan was prepared 1. Yes, 2. No 6.8. If no, what are the reasons?

1. Lack of skilled manpower 2. Lack of resources 3. No instruction from upper level 4. Others (Please specify) ----------------

6.9. If yes, in which year it was prepared? --------------------- 6.10. If yes, who prepared this plan?

1. 2. 3. 4.

6.11. Whether the officials have experience/ training for plan making

1. Yes, 2. No

6.12. If yes, who gave the training? 1. NILG 2. ADC (Revenue ) 3. Divisional commissioner’s office 4. NGO Staff 5. Others (Please Specify)--------------------

6.13. If yes, is there any guideline for Five Year Plan? 1.Yes 2.No

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6.14. Upazila Five year plan

Part Sl No. Description

2011-2012

2012-2013 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16

Part-1 (Revenue)

1 Received 2 Revenue 3 Grant 4 Total receipt (A) 5 Additional revenue

expenditure

6 Revenue surplus / deficit

Part-2 (Developm

ent account)

1 Development grant 2 Others grants / revenue

surplus

3 Total B 4 Total assets received

(A+B)

5 Minus development expenditure

6 Total budget surplus / deficit

7 Plus initial balance 8 Total budget balance

6.15. Allocation of five year plan in line with the MDGs

Sl No.

MDGs 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16



3. Women empowerment and equality between male and female



6. Combating HIV / AIDS, malaria and other diseases

7. Sustainable Development


6.16. Whether any development plan has been prepared incorporating the needs of local deprived and

marginalized group (Dalit /Diener /Morgue staff, sweeper, persons with disability, etc? 6.17. If yes, please give an example:

…………………………………………………………… Section 7: Right to Information (RTI) Act

112

7.1. Has any officers been appointed to provide information to the citizens as per the Right to Information Act 2009? 1. Yes 2.No

7.2. If no, why has not been appointed?

1. Did not know, whether it is necessary to appoint 2. Did not think necessary 3. Was not any instruction from local government division 4. Others (Please specify)-----------------

7.3. Is there any provision for Right to Information Act? 1. Yes, 2. No 7.4. If yes, what measures are taken?

1. Appointed /designated an official for providing information 2. Detailed addresses of the officers were sent to information commission within 15 days of his /

her appointment 3. Applicants receive information duly 4. If any information cannot be provided applicants are informed within 10 days 5. Others (please specify)---------------

7.5 . How many applications have been received for information in last one year? ----------------- number 7.6. How many applicants were provided the information applied for? ---------------- persons 7.7. If not possible how many applicants were informed within 10 days?------------ persons 7.8. Does anybody complain for not getting information timely? 1. Yes, 2. No 7.9. If yes, How many persons? --------------------------- 7.10. Whether annual report is prepared in line with the Right to Information Act (RTI Act) 1. Yes, 2. No 7.11. Whether the Upazila Parishad has own website 1. Yes 2.No 7.12. If yes, what is the address of website? ------------------------- Section 8: For the members of Upazila Parishad 8.1. Does any counseling meeting hold in Upazila Parishad? 1. Yes, 2. No 8.2. If no, what are the reasons?

1. 2. 3.

8.3. If yes, please provide answers to the following questions Type of meetings 2009-10 2010-11 2011-12 Number of meetings General meetings Coordination meetings Emergency meetings 8.4. Does the working paper prepare for the Upazila Parishad meeting? 1.Yes 2.No 8.5. If no, Why dose not working paper prepare?

1. Do not know the matter of preparing the working paper 2. Do not know how to prepare the working paper 3. No instruction who will prepare the working paper 4. No instruction from local government division 5. Others (Please specify)--------------------

8.6. Do the agendas of the meeting be prepared? 1.Yes 2.No 8.7. If no, why do not been prepared?

1. Do not know the matter of preparing the working paper 2. Do not know how to prepare the working paper 3. No instruction who will prepare the working paper 4. No instruction from local government division

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5. Others (Please specify)-------------------- 8.8. Who does call the meeting of the parishad?

1. Local Member of Parliament 2. Chairman 3. UNO 4. Vice-chairman 5. Female Vice-chairman 6. Others (please specify)----------------

8.9. Who do attend the meetings? 1. 2. 3. 4.

8.10. How many days before the meeting the notice is being served? -----------day 8.11. Are there opportunities of equal voice of the participants in the meeting? 1. Yes, 2. No 8.12. Does the Member of Parliament (MP) attend the meeting? 1. Regular 2. Irregular, 3. No 8.13. Whether any training given on how to conduct the meeting of the Upazila Parishad

8.14. (If yes, in question # 8.1), please provide the answers to the following questions? Name of the women participants

Position in the parishad. Such as: Vice-chairman

Number of attendance in the meeting during last one year

Have you given opinion spontaneously? 1.Yes 2.No

What was the number of issues you raised in the last meeting?

How many of your issues were discussed?

Number of issues included as agenda in the meeting

8.15. (If yes, in question # 8.1) please provide the answers to the following questions? Name of the Male participants

Position in the parishad. Such as: Vice-chairman

Number of attendance in the meeting during last one year

Have you given opinion spontaneously? 1.Yes 2.No

What was the number of issues you raised in the last meeting?

How many of your issues were discussed?

Number of issues included as agenda in the meeting

Section 9: Gender Balance

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9.1| What was/is the % of allocation for women and children affairs department of Upazila out of total

development expenditure of UZP in the financial year 2011-12 and 2012-13? ( a) 2011-12 Financial year= ----------------------% (b) 2012-13 Financial year= -----------------------% 9.2| What training received by the female vice-chairman (reserved) so far? Sl. No Subject of Training How many days Venues of training Resource persons

9.3| Information of departmental training received by the women and children affairs officers of the Upazila parishad

Sl. No Subject of Training How many days Venues of training Resource persons

9.4| Information on departmental training received by the Upazila secondary and madrasa education

officers Sl. No Subject of Training How many days Venues of training Resource persons 9.5| Information of departmental training received by the Upazila primary and mass education officers. Sl. No Subject of Training How many days Venues of training Resource persons

9.6| Whether the election of reserved seats of women councilors in Upazila has been held? 1. Yes 2. No

9.7| If yes, how many has been elected so far? ------------------ persons

9.8| If no, what are the reasons? 1. 2. 3. 4.

9.9| Has the women’s development forum in Upazila been registered at the district level? 1. Yes 2. No

9.10| If yes, how many have been registered? ------------------------

9.11| Gender wise statistics of elected representatives and departmental government officers of the Upazila Parishad

Sl. No Ministry / Department/Directorate

Designation / Position Sex: 1.Male

Number of

Where does live? 1. In the residence

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2. Female present post

building of Upazila Parishad. 2. In Upazila but not in the official residence 3. In Dhaka 4. Others

1. Local Government Upazila Chairman 1 2. Local Government Vice-Chairman (except

reserved seat) 1

3. Local Government Upazila Nirbahi Officer (UNO)

1

4. Local Government Upazila Engineer 1 5. Local Government Assistant Upazila Engineer 6. Agriculture Upazila Agriculture Officer 1 7. Agriculture Assistant Agriculture

Officer 1

8. Agriculture Agriculture extension officer

1

9. Fisheries and Livestock Senior Upazila/ Upazila Fisheries Officer

1

10. Fisheries and Livestock Assistant Upazila Fisheries Officer

1

11. Fisheries and Livestock Upazila Livestock Officer 1 12. Fisheries and Livestock Assistant Upazila Livestock

Officer 1

13. Women and children affairs Upazila Women and Children affairs officer

1

14. Education Upazila secondary and madrasa education officer

1

15. Education Upazila primary and mass education officer

1

16. Health and family planning Upazila health and family planning officer

1

17. Health and family planning Upazila family planning officer

1

18. Youth and sports Youth and sports officer 1 19. Social welfare Social welfare officer 1 20. Local government, rural

development and cooperative Rural development officer 1

21. Local government, rural development and cooperative

Cooperative officer 1

22. Environment and forest Environment and forest officer

1

23. In charge of market price observation, monitoring, and controlling

24. Officers of Finance, budget, planning, and local resources mobilization

25. Local government, rural development and cooperative

DPHE Engineer

26. Freedom fighter affairs Freedom fighter affairs officer

27. Defense Thana Officer in Charge (OC)

28. Defense Thana second officer 29. Assistant commissioner

(land) / AC land 1

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30. Sub registrar 31.

9.12. Has the annual performance report been prepared? 1. Yes, 2. No 9.13. If yes, in which year the report has been prepared? ---------------------Year. Name and code of Interviewer-------------------------------------- Name and code of Supervisor--------------------------------------

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Personal Information Date of Interview: District:________________________ Upazila ___________________________

Union_____________________ Village: ________________________

Name Sex 1=Male 2=Female

Age (Year)

Education (Code)

Occupation (Code)

Address (Home / Name of Mouza)

No of HH members

Monthly HH income

Monthly HH expenditure

Distance from village to Upazila

Phone No

Education code: Iliteracy =50, Only read=51, Only can sign-52, Can read and sign=53, If pass specific class=Specific class, SSC=10, HSC=12, Graduation (pass course)=15, Graduations (honors) =16 Post Graduate=18, Vocational diploma=19, Children = 99 Agriculture Code: Agriculture =1, Livestock =2, Poultry =3, Fishery=4, Fruit gardening =5, Agri day labour=6, Non agri day labour=7, Rickswa / van puller=8, Handicrafts =9, Food processing=10, Cottage industry=11, Fisherman=12, Transport labour=13, Small business=14, Big business=15, Low level work (construction worker, handloom etc)=16, Journalist=17, Home makers=18, Housewife=19, Student=20, Unemployed=21, Service=22, Dependent=23, Pensionholder=24, Saloon=25, poter =26, shoe-maker=27 Teacher(Primary)=28, Teacher (Secondary)=29, Teacher (College)=30, Teacher (retired)=31, Advocate=32, UP Member=33, Others=34

yyyymm dd

118

Section 1: Information on Upazila Parishad Services 1.1| Do you visit Upazila? 1. Yes, 2. No

1.2| If yes, how many times did you visit in last 3 months? ----------------- Times

1.3| Usualy for what purpose do you visit Upazila? 1. Land related works 2. Health services 3. Family planning 4. Education related works 5. Fisheries and livestock related works 6. Project related works in Upazila 7. Resolve local conflict 8. Receive banking service 9. Law and order issue

10. Sports and culture related works 11. Others (Please specify) ------------------

1.4| Score on the line departments’ services Sl No.

Type of Services Evaluation Score (1-5) 1.Very Good, 2.Good 3. Average 4. Bad, 5. Very Bad

1. Law and order 2. Communication and infrastructure development 3. Agriculture and irrigation 4. Secondary and madrasa education 5. Primary and mass education

6. Health and family welfare 7. Youth and sports 8. Women and children development 9. Social welfare 10. Freedom fighter 11. Fisheries and livestock 12. Rural development and cooperative 13. Culture 14. Forest and environment 15. Observation, monitoring and controlling of

market price


17. Public health, sanitation and supply of safe drainage water

18. Land related service 19. Others (please specify)-----------

1.5| Satisfiction level on civic facility

Sl No.

Civic facility of Upazila Evaluation Score (1-5) 1.Very Good, 2.Good 3. Average 4. Bad, 5. Very Bad, 6. No comments /don’t Know

119

1. Upazila Library 2. Entertainment

3. Sports field 4. Vehicle conjestion

5. Bus/ truck/tempo stand 6. Market place

7. Others (Please Specify)----------------

Section: 2 Information on activities of Upazila Parishad

2.1| Satisfiction on activities of Upazila Parishad

Sl. No

Type of Activities (Read to the respondents) Do you have idea? 1. Yes 2. No

Satisfiction on activity 1.Yes, 2. No 3. So so

1. Prepare five year plan and other development plans 2. Implementation / Coordination of different government

agencies agenda

3. Construction maintenance and repaire of inter-union roads

4. Selection & implementation of small irrigation projects 5. Public health, nutrition and family planning service 6. Sanitation, drainage and supply of safe drinking water 7. Expand of Upazila wide education 8. Maintenance and donate for secondary and madrasa

education

9. Expand and build of small industries 10. Financing assistance to cooperative societies and

voluntary organizations.

11. Assistance to women, children, social welfare, youth and cultural activities

12. Development of agriculture, livestock, fisheries and forestry

13. Improvement of law and order 14. Self employment and poverty reduction 15. Coordination and assistance to development activities of

Union Parishad

16. Protect acid through, abuse of children and women 17. Protecting theft, robbery, use of narcotics, terrorism, etc. 18. Social welfare 19. Disaster management 20. Cooperation with other organizations 21. Encourage e-governance services 22. Any duty imposed by government

2.2| Do you know about different development plans of Upazila Parishad 1. Yes 2. No 2.3| If yes, please provide information on annual development plan on the following issues Sl. No

Development plans Has prepared a plan? 1.Yes, 2. No, 3. Don’t know

Evaluation score (1-5) 1.highly satisfied, 2. Satisfied, 3. less satisfied, 4. No satisfaction, 5.Totaly not satisfied

1. Law and order 2. Communication and infrastructure development

120

3. Agriculture and irrigation 4. Secondary and madrasa education 5. Primary and mass education 6. Health and family welfare 7. Youth and sports 8. Women and children development 9. Social welfare 10. Freedom fighter 11. Fisheries and livestock 12. Rural development and cooperative 13. Culture 14. Forest and environment 15. Observation, monitoring and controlling of market

price


17. Public health, sanitation and supply of safe drinking water

2.4| Do you know about responsibilities and duties of Upazila Chairman? 1. Yes 2. No 2.5| If yes, what types of duties and responsibilities do you know? Sl No

Duties and responsibilities of Upazila Chairman Do you have idea? 1. Yes 2. No

1. Day to day administrative matters

2. Chair all Upazila parishad meetings

3. Supervise all staffs

4. Recruit staffs and take disciplinary actions if necessary

5. Project preparation and implementation

6. Keep records of Upazila Parishad related all data 7. Signing contract 8. Issuing license and permit 9. Protect crime and resolving conflict 10. Any duty inposed by govt. 11. Proceed to court if necessary 12. Monitoring vice-chairmans duties 2.6| Do you know about responsibilities and duties of Upazila Vice- Chairmans? 1. Yes 2.

No

2.7| If yes, please provide opinion about following duties and responsibilities of vice-chairman.

Sl. No

Duties and Responsibilities Whether accomplish duties effectively? 1. Yes 2. No

1. Chair of steering committees

2. Act as chair in absence of chairman 3. Motivate people for education expansion 4. Coordinating activities of educational institutions 5. Construction , maintenance and repaire of roads 6. Selection & implementation of small irrigation projects 7. Take preventive steps to protect crime 8. Social plantation

121

9. Expansion of youth, sports and cultural activities 10. Development of agriculture and forestry 11. Any duty imposed by govt./chairman

2.8| If yes, provide opinion about following duties and responsibilities of women vice-chairman.

Sl No

Duties and responsibilities Whether accomplish duties effectively? 1.yes 2.No

1. Chair of steering committee 2. Act as chair in absence of chairman 3. Ensuring health, nutrition, family planning and maternity services 4. Develop sanitation and drainage systems 5. Improve conditions of women and childrens 6. Develope small industries 7. Self employment and poverty reduction 8. Protect abuse of children and women, Dowry, polygamy etc. 9. Develope livestock and fisheries 10. Monitoring cooperative societies and voluntary organizations activities 11. Social welfare 12. Any duty imposed by govt/chairman 2.9| Activities of Upazila chairman and vice-chairman Chairman Women vice-chairman

(reserved) Vice-Chairman

Regular Irregular Regular Irregular Regular Irregular Come to Upazila parishad office

Visit project sites Attend cultural programs

Resolve conflict Celebrate national days

2.10| Evaluation of Upazila chairman and vice-chairman’s activities Types of representative Evaluation Scores (1-5)

1.Very good, 2.Good, 3. Average, 4. Bad 5. Very bad Chairman Women vice-chairman Vice-chairman

2.11| Do you know the role of MPs in the development of Upazila? 1. Yes 2. No 2.12| If yes, what kind of role s/he plays?

1. 2. 3. 4.

2.13| What is your opinion about the role of the MP in development activities of Upazila? 1. Highly satisfied, 2. Less satisfied 3.Not satisfied, 4. No comments

2.14| Do you know about project selection and implementation process in the Upazila? 1. Yes 2.No

2.15| If yes, how projects are selected and implemented?

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1. 2. 3. 4.

2.16| Do you know what is the budget of 2011-12? 1.Yes 2.No

2.17| If yes, how much? ------------------ Tk.

2.18| Have you ever attended Upazila budget meeting? 1.Yes 2.No

2.19| Did you have any comments on the budget? 1.Yes 2.No Section 3: Structure of Upazila Parishad 3.1| Who are in Upazila Parishads

1. 2. 3. 4.

3.2| Is it possible to see UZP official, if necessary? 1.Yes, 2.No

3.3| If yes, whom it is easier to see? 1. Upazila Chairman 2. Vice-Chairman 3. Women vice-chairman 4. Upazila Nirbahi Officer 5. Union Parishad Chairman 6. Pourashava Mayor 7. Women members (researved seats) 8. Others (specify)-----------------------------

3.4| If no, do you know the rules and procedures of UZP? 1.Yes, 2.No

3.5| What kind of working relationship exists between UPZ chairman and UNO? 1. Good / Cooperative 2. Bad / Non Cooperative 3. Don’t know

3.6| If good relation does not exist, what are the reasons?

1. 2. 3. 4.

3.8| How such non cooperation affect UZP development activities? 1. 2. 3. 4.

3.9| What kind of measures’ can be taken to improve the situation? 1. 2. 3. 4.

123

3.10| How coordination between UP and UZP can be improved?

1. 2. 3. 4.

Section 4: Good Governance 4.1| Have you tried to get information from UZP? 1.Yes 2.No

4.2| If yes, have you got it? 1.Yes 2.No

4.3| If yes, after how many days you got it? --------------- days

4.4| Do you know whether UZP Citizens’ Charters has been prepared? 1.Yes 2.No

4.5| If yes, have you seen it? 1.Yes 2.No v

4.6| If yes, where have you seen?

1. Notice board of UZP 2. Union Parishad 3. Website of UZP 4. Others (Please specify) -------------------------------

4.7| What issues are included in the Citizen Charter?

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Have not read

4.8| Whether any anti-corruption measures are taken in UZP? 1.Yes 2.No

4.9| If yes, what measures are taken? 1. Complain box 2. Citizens’ Charter 3. 4.

4.10| If not, what measures do you suggest for anti-corruption? 1. 2. 3. 4.

4.11| When do you usually visit UZP? 1. Morning 2.Noon 3. After noon

4.12| Are UZP officials available in the office? Sl No Designation of Officers Whether available in the office

1. Yes 2. No 3. Sometimes Morning Noon Afternoon

1. Upazila Chairman 2. Vice-Chairman 3. Women Vice-Chairman 4. UNO 5. Upazila Health Officers / Doctors 6. AC Land 7. Social Welfare officers

8. Upazila Engineers

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9. Upazila Agricultural officer

10. Upazila Cooperative Officer 11. Rural Development Officer

12. Project Implementation Officer

4.13| If officials are not in the office do you go to their residence? 1.Yes 2.No

4.14| If yes, are they available at residence? 1.Yes 2.No

4.15| If no, Why?

1. They don’t reside regularly at government residence 2. Don’t meet even at home 3. Others (please specify) -----------------------------

4.16| To your knowledge, which Upazila officials do not regularly reside at government residences?

1. Upazila Chairman 2. Vice-chairman 3. Women vice-chairman 4. UNO 5. Pourashava Mayor 6. Others (please specify)------------------

4.17| In case of not getting service, is their any complain box in UZP? 1.Yes 2.No

4.18| If yes, have you made any complain ever? 1.Yes, 2.No

4.19| Have you received any response of your complain? 1.Yes 2.No 4.20| Do you know whether Jeep, fuel, furniture and other stuffs of UZP are utilized properly?

1.Yes, 2.No, 3.Don’t Know

4.21| If not, which are those? 1. Jeep 2. House 3. Furniture 4. Stationary 5. Others (Please specify)-------------------

4.22| Who are not using those stuffs properly?

1. Upazila Chairman 2. Vice-chairman 3. Women vice-chairman 4. UNO 5. Pourashava Mayor 6. Others (please specify)------------------

4.23| What are your suggestions on the proper use of UPZ stuffs?

1. 2. 3. 4.

Section 5: Strengthening Upazila System

125

5.1| What other roles UZP can play for the development of your locality?

1. 2. 3. 4.

5.2| What other services do you expect from UZP?

1. 2. 3.

5.3| What are your suggestions to further strengthen the UZP?

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Name and code of Interviewer-----------------------------------

Name and code of Superviser -----------------------------------------

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