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Danish Disability Fund

APPLICATIONC: MAJOR DEVELOPMENT PROJECT (UP TO DKK 5 MILL)

& COOPERATION PROJECT (UP TO DKK 2 MILL)

D: PROJECT OF MORE THAN DKK 5 MILLION

1. Cover pageGrant modality(insert X)

C: Cooperation project between several org.

C: Major development project X

D: Project of more than DKK 5 million

Danish applicant organisation (financially responsible):

Danske Døves Landsforbund (DDL)

Contact person for the project: Name: Kasper BergmannEmail: [email protected]: 20900660

Other Danish partner(s):(if relevant)South partner(s): Ghana National Association of the Deaf (GNAD)

World Federation of the Deaf’s West and Central Africa Regional Secretariat (WCARS)Association des Sourds du Niger (ASN)Association des Sourds du Togo (AST)Association Malienne pour les Sourds (AMASOURDS)Association Nationale des Sourds de Côte d’Ivoire (ANASOCI)

Project title: Transnational capacity building project for deaf associationsProjet transnational de renforcement des capacités pour les Associations des Sourds

Country(ies): Ghana, Niger, Togo, Mali, and Côte d’Ivoire

Country’s GDP per capita: Between 399 USD (Niger) and 1.902 USD (Ghana)

Project period: Commencement date: 01-07-2017

Completion date:30-04-2020

Total number of months: 34

Total amount applied for: 3.082.600 DKK (3.000.000 DKK excl. disability compensation)

Is this a new project? [ ] A. Yes, a new project.[ X ] B. A project in extension of a project that has been supported (by the Danish Disability Fund or others), indicate Disability Fund ref. no. if it applies: HP 142-096

Is this a re-submission? (i.e. a revised version of a previously submitted application).[ X ] No[ ] Yes, date/year of previous application:

Do you want a response letter in

[ ] Danish or[ X ] English

Insert synthesis of the project in DanishDette projekt er den anden fase af en planlagt længerevarende intervention. Første fase var en inception fase (HP 142-096, 01-01-2016 – 30-04-2017). Ideen er at bygge videre på de gode erfaringer DDL og GNAD har opnået i at styrke GNAD og arbejdet for at sikre døves rettigheder i Ghana. Erfaringerne, som GNAD har opnået, vil blive spredt videre til nabolandene omring Ghana og styrke døveforbundene i Elfenbenskysten, Mali, Niger og Togo. WFD har tidligere haft et projekt i Vest- og Centralafrika, erfaringerne og anbefalingerne herfra er

Application – C: Major development project /Cooperation project – DANISH DISABILITY FUND (Oct. 2015) D: Project of more than DKK 5 million – DANISH DISABILITY FUND (Oct. 2015)

To be filled in by DPODDisability Fund ref. no.Date received

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inkorporeret i dette projekt sammen med læringspunkterne og anbefalingerne fra den første fase – f.eks. at opbygge en korps af døve trainers, som kan gennemføre workshops og supervise de 4 døveforbund i deres arbejde. Der arbejdes meget med erfaringsudveksling og vidensdeling på tværs af landene for at opnå synergieffekter. Systematiseringen af dette arbejde er forankret i WCARS, som er et regional samarbejdsorgan for døveforbundene i Vest- og Centralafrika. Der udvikles også en læringsplatform for at strukturere og systematisere undervisningsmaterialerne til dette og andre fremtidige projekter.

01-03-2017Date Person responsible (signature)

Copenhagen Per Fruerled, direktørPlace Person responsible and position (block letters)

2. Application text1. WHAT IS THE CONTEXT AND THE PROBLEM?

1.a The overall context

Political and legal environment in NigerNiger, officially the Republic of Niger, is a landlocked country in Western Africa, named after the Niger River. Niger covers a land area of almost 1,270,000 km2, making it the largest country in West Africa, with over 80 percent of its land area covered by the Sahara Desert with its capital town as Niamey located in the far-southwest corner. The country's predominantly Islamic population of about 19 million is mostly clustered in the far south and west of the country.

Niger is a developing country ranking 188th (last place) in the 2014 United Nations’ Human Development Index (HDI Much of the non-desert portions of the country are threatened by periodic drought and desertification. The economy is concentrated around subsistence and some export agriculture clustered in the more fertile south, and the export of raw materials, especially uranium ore. Niger faces serious challenges to development due to its landlocked position, desert terrain, inefficient agriculture, high fertility rates and resulting overpopulation without birth control, poor education and poverty of its people, lack of infrastructure, poor health care, and environmental degradation.

Since independence, Nigeriens have lived under five constitutions and three periods of military rule. Following a military coup in 2010, Niger has become a democratic, multi-party state. A majority live in rural areas, and have little access to advanced education.

There is a dearth of data on legislations and policies concerning PWDs in the Republic of Niger. However, the government of the Nigerien State in accordance with Order No. 93-012 / PRN / MDS / P / PF / PE of 2 March 1993 have set a Minimum Rules for the Protection of Persons with Disabilities and subsequent amending acts fixing the rate of membership of persons with disabilities in the public service to 3%. These rules focus on the employment of PWDs including the deaf people setting out an agreed percentage of all public sector for PWDs.

Since most recruitment into the labour force is based on technical experiences, deaf people are most likely to experience multiple challenges in access as a result of their unique communication needs. There is consensus among DPOs, CSOs and policy makers that deaf people are often disadvantaged in terms of access to social support system.


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The state has also signed the CRPD and ratified the optional protocol to the convention. However, at the time of the assessment, national level policies to address the needs of PWDs have not been initiated.

Political and legal environment in MaliMali, officially the Republic of Mali is a landlocked country in West Africa. Mali is the eighth-largest country in Africa, with an area of just over 1,240,000 km2 and a population of 14.5 million. Its capital is Bamako. Mali consists of eight regions and its borders on the north reach deep into the middle of the Sahara Desert, while the country’s southern part, where the majority of inhabitants live, features the Niger and Senegal rivers. The country’s economy centers on agriculture and fishing. About half the population lives below the international poverty line of $1.25 a day. A majority of the population (90%) are Muslims.

Mali achieved indepence in 1960 as the Republic of Mali. After a long period of one-party rule, a coup in 1991 led to the writing of a new constitution and the establishment of Mali as a democratic, multi-party state.

In January 2012, an armed conflict broke out in northern Mali, in which Tuareg rebels took control of by April and declared the secession of a new state, Azawad. The conflict was complicated by a military coup that took place in March and later fighting between Tuareg and Islamist rebels. In response to Islamist territorial gains, the French military launched Opération Serval in January 2013. A month later, Malian and French forces recaptured most of the north. Presidential elections were held on 28 July 2013, with a second round run-off held on 11 August, and legislative elections were held on 24 November and 15 December 2013.

The socio-economic situations in Mali is particular precarious and according to the UN’s Human Development Index, Mali ranked 182 out of 187 with a poverty rate of approx. 46.3% as of 2012. Little information is however available on the situation of PWDs and the recent armed conflicts in several parts of the state has worsened the already precarious situation of PWDs.

According to several small-scale studies, PWDs in Mali are extreme vulnerable in a country with high rate of poverty and armed conflicts. PWDs are more likely to be jobless, extreme poor, drop out of school and have limited access to social and economic support system. This is further fueled by socio-economic practices such as forced early marriage in given its prominent Islamic culture, Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), and lack of access to basic family planning treatments.

While Mali ranked very low in Human Development Index, the state has recognized the needs of the disabled. Some of these efforts include attempt to eradicate unemployment among PWDs by reserving 5% of public sector employment for PWDs, giving annual support to organizations of persons with disabilities (OPWDs) to support their administrative work and absorbing of special schools into the public schooling system.

However laudable these initiatives might be, there is presently no regulatory framework that can support and sustain government efforts at promoting the rights of PWDs in Mali. The 1992 Constitution of Mali guarantees rights of all persons, but according to scholars, is silent on the rights of PWDs.

In 2009, Mali adopted a ‘Persons with Disabilities Bill’. The bill offers a number of protections to PWDs with the disability issues are mainly coordinated by the Ministry of Social Development and Solidarity as the main coordinating agency with support from other state institutions.

The government of Mali signed and ratified the UN CRPD and the optional protocol to the convention. The country has also signed and ratified a number of international human rights treaties and polices. Nevertheless, very little has been done to give effects to the engagements within the convention and to improve the living conditions of PWDs in the country.

Political and legal enviroment in Togo


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Togo, officially the Togolese Republic, is a country in West Africa, the capital is Lomé which is located at the southern coast. Togo covers 57,000 square kilometres, making it one of the smallest countries in Africa, with a population of approximately 7.5 million. Togo gained its independence from France in 1960.

Togo is a tropical, sub-Saharan nation, highly dependent on agriculture, with a climate that provides good growing seasons. The official language is French, with many other languages spoken in Togo, particularly those of the Gbe family. The largest religious group in Togo consists of those with indigenous beliefs, and there are significant Christian and Muslim minorities.

Approximately 630,000 people in Togo live with at least one disability and according to the latest national census of Togo, an estimated 36,000 people are classified as having some form of hearing loss. Like most PWDs in developing nations, significant portion of PWDs live in extreme poverty. According to reliable reports, 69 % of families in Togo are affected by poverty with regional inequities. The northern sector experiences the worse form of poverty compared to the southern part with many disabled children deprived of access to safe drinking water, basic education, adequate nutrition and shelter.

Togo is a secular state where different religious denominations co-exist and a multiparty democracy system of government, the constitution of Togo guarantees a number of fundamental human rights for the citizens. Like most countries, Togo is a signatory to several international and regional human rights treaties: The African Charter on Human and People’s Rights, the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention for the Elimination of Discrimination against Women. Togo also ratified the disability specific UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the optional protocol to the convention in 2011.

Although the country signs a number of national and international laws, there is currently no comprehensive domestic legislation, policies, programs and domestic legal framework that can enhance the lives of the disabled in the 5 regions of Togo.

Political and legal environment in Côte d’IvoireCôte d’Ivoire or Ivory Coast, officially named the Republic of Côte d’Ivoire, is a country located in West Africa. Côte d’Ivoire’s political capital is Yamoussoukro, and its economic capital and largest city is the port city of Abidjan. Côte d’Ivoire achieved independence in 1960 led by Félix Houphouët-Boigny, who ruled the country until 1993. Since the end of Houphouët-Boigny’s rule in 1993, Côte d’Ivoire has experienced one coup d’état, in 1999, and two religion-grounded civil wars. The first took place between 2002 and 2007 and the second during 2010-2011.

The official language is French, with local indigenous languages also widely used, including Baoulé, Dioula, Dan, Anyin, and Cebaara Senufo. In total there are around 78 languages spoken in Côte d’Ivoire. The main religions are Islam, Christianity (primarily Roman Catholicism), and various indigenous religions.

A secular state where different religious denominations co-exist, the Republic of Côte d’Ivoire practices a statueal and multiparty democracy system of government and the 2000 republican statue guaranteed a number of fundamental human rights for the citizens. The democratic political regime opted for by the Ivorian people brought a lot of hope during the past few years.

The Republic of Côte d’Ivoire is a signatory to several national and international as well as regional human rights treaties; the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights, the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention for the Elimination of Discrimination against Women. Côte d’Ivoire also ratified the disability specific UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the optional protocol to the convention. Nevertheless, there is no comprehensive domestic legislations, policies, programs and domestic legal framework that can enhance the lives of the disabled in the Côte d’Ivoire communities.

Thus, like deaf people elsewhere in Africa, deaf in Côte d’Ivoire face multiple barriers, they have limited opportunities, face inaccessible physical, societal and institutional barriers that systematically exclude them


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in mainstream development process. Stigmatization, exclusion and low level of education attainment prevent PWDs from enjoying the same opportunities as their non-disabled counterparts.

1.b Specific challenges faced by those groups of persons with disabilities, or their organisations, for whom the project aims to bring about change

The deaf specific context in generalThere is no statistical record available on the number of deaf population in the Western and Central African region. Based on the deaf associations’ estimates, the population in four of the countries is 256,000. Nonetheless, it is difficult to estimate reliability of this number. In fact, this number might be much higher, because deaf people often live scattered without any contact to the national associations of the deaf or deaf groups. The most common estimates are between 0.1% of the population in developed countries and as high as 1% of the population in post-conflict countries. The WHO estimates that on average 0.5% of a country’s population has hearing impairments1, which includes both deaf and hard of hearing. Of this deaf population, only a small number use sign language(s). However, there is a great variety within countries as in some countries deaf population widely uses sign language where as in others the knowledge of sign language is weak.

Table 1: Estimated number of deaf people and members of the deaf associations

Country Total population TDA estimated# of deaf people

WHO estimated# of deaf people

# of members of association

Côte d’Ivoire 22,400,000 85,000 112,000 810

Ghana 24,200,000 110,000 121,000 7,200

Mali 14,500,000 N/A 72,500 3,221

Niger 17,100,000 25,000 85,500 16,000

Togo 7,200,000 36,000 36,000 160

Total 85,400,000 > 256,000 427,000 27,391

Main challenges for the deaf in NigerNiger has signed and ratified the CRPD. However, implementation of the legal provisions within the convention have not been initiated. Advocacy by the Nigerien Federation of People with Disabilities (FNPH), which ASN is a member of, have resulted in the allocation of 5% of employment in public sector for PWDs. This however is subject to academic and technical qualifications. More deaf people could not benefit from the opportunities created by the National Assembly because many deaf have low level of education attainment.

Inadequate Sign Language interpreters Niger does not have qualified Sign Language interpreters that could facilitate communication barriers among the deaf and hearing people. The existing ones are teachers from the various schools for the deaf. Efforts have been made in the past to train individuals in basic Sign Language by the deaf association, but there is currently no institution that trains SLIs. The deaf community is therefore excluded from most public information, goods and services.

Weak leadership capacityThe capacity of the ASN to effectively carry out effective advocacy has been weak. This capacity gap has been attributed to lack of trainings and capacity building programmes. Lack of capacity to effectively engage with duty bearers and state actors have result in inability to mobilize support and to effectively utilize existing laws as advocacy tools to promote the rights of the deaf community.The deaf community of Niger is therefore fragile and most of its advocacy centred on meeting the most basic and immediate needs of the individuals.

Sign LanguageAlthough there are different sign languages and communication modes used by membership of the ASN majority of deaf Nigeriens use Hausa Sign Language. The Hausa Sign Language is unique to the Niger deaf people and is highly a local language with its own unique characteristics. It is very clear that Hausa Sign 1 WHO World Report on Disability, 2011


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Language is in fact a bona fide Sign Language complete with its own vocabulary, grammar and structure unique to people in this country. In addition to the Hausa Sign Language, many of the deaf members in Niger communicate with the ASL. This form of language is however unique to deaf people who have been to the schools for the deaf where the ASL is the main means of instructions.

Although the Republic of Niger ratified the UN CRPD and the optional protocol, the Hausa Sign Language as well as ‘state issued’ SL are not recognized as official languages although they are used as medium of instruction in deaf schools.

EducationNiger currently has three schools for the deaf located in three regions: Zinder, Niamey, and Maradi. These schools are the handiwork of ASN although the state has taken over the management including payment of teachers’ salaries.

All the schools have strong links with the ASN and the association has the responsibility to support in mapping children for admissions, advocacy for support for the students’ needs and training of teachers in SL. The state supports the school, books and other teaching and learning materials. NGOs, banks, etc. also support with feeding while parents contribute to support cooking. All the schools are day schools and there is currently no High School for the deaf. Deaf students participate in SHS education with hearing people with no Sign Language support services. It was however explained that some adult deaf have to give volunteer support to the students although this is just volunteer work with no payment from the colleges. The same applies to college and universities where deaf people learn on their own. It was therefore no wonder that there has been mass dropout rate among deaf Nigeriens from school.

Main challenges for the deaf in MaliAlthough the government of Mali signed the UN CRPD and ratified the convention, the state has no domestic legislation protecting the right of PWDs in Mali. Deaf people in particular encounter severe access barriers and encounter twice the challenges other PWDs encounter. Lack of qualified Sign Language interpreters, inadequate personals to support the communication needs of the deaf, low level of education attainment resulting in low employment and low earning rate and other human rights abuse significantly exclude deaf people in most decision making. Deaf people are therefore excluded from accessing public goods and services

Inadequate Sign Language interpreters Mali does not have qualified Sign Language interpreters that could facilitate communication barriers among the deaf and hearing people. The existing ones are teachers from the various schools for the deaf. Efforts have been made in the past to train individuals in basic Sign Language by the deaf association, but there is currently no institution that trains SLIs. The deaf community is therefore excluded from most public information, goods and services.

Low capacity among national associationThe capacity of AMASOURDS to both carry out right-based approach to advocacy, participate in decision making and press for the needs of the deaf community is particular low. This is attributed to lack of effective training and capacity building programmes. Subsequently, the deaf community do not have the ability to effectively utilize existing legal frameworks to address exclusion and barriers that face the deaf.

Low visibility in public spaceThe deaf community in Mali is also weakly visible in public space. Unlike other DPOs, the deaf community is not effectively represented in major decision making nor has the community been consulted in major decisions that have bearing on their lives. This coupled with lack of awareness creating has resulted in lack of access to public goods and services for the deaf.

Sign Language


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The Malian deaf community has two sign languages: American Sign Language and Bambara Sign Language (also widely known as LaSiMa – Malinese Sign Language). Those, who did not have the opportunity to attend deaf school use LaSiMa. Those, who attend the deaf school use ASL.

The LaSiMa is commonly used by both educated and non-educated deaf while the ASL is used mostly by those who have been to the schools for the deaf. Both the director and the SLI that were present are more fluent in the LaSiMa than the ASL although they had some grasp of the ASL. The deaf community has developed a sign language dictionary since 1999 with financial support from CECI. There are few TV stations that promote the use of SL in the news.

EducationFor many years, there was no deaf school in the entire country and the Association decided to take up the task of establishing a deaf school in Bamako in early 1990s along with support from CECI Canada and few other organisations from the Netherlands, France and Belgium. There were two valuable achievements by the association dating back to the early 1990s, the establishment of two deaf schools on both sides of the river in Bamako; each school serves deaf children on that side of the river.

The Republic of Mali currently has 8 schools for the deaf which are all managed by the state with strong link to the deaf association. The highest level of schooling a deaf person can reach within a resources rich environment is Junior High School. There is current no Secondary High School for the deaf and no college or university. At the university level, deaf students who managed to reach that level are not provided SLIs and note takers. There is therefore very low education attainment among deaf Malians.

Main challenges for the deaf in TogoLike many PWDs in most developing nations, many of the PWDs in Togo do experience exclusion from social and institutional support system. Unemployment is higher among the disabled compared to their non-disabled counterparts with deaf people accounting for higher per cent. Socially held views about disability has not been changed. Disability is perceived in the context of cultural beliefs, myths and stereotypical views that dehumanize PWDs and fundamentally hinder full access to and participation of the disabled people in mainstream society. Like elsewhere in the world, women with disabilities face the greatest burden of cultural discrimination.

Togo ratified the UN CRPD and the optional protocol on 1st March 2011, but there is currently no domestic disability rights legislation. A drafted disability rights legislation had been in place and was at the consultative stage during the assessment session.

Key among the challenges the deaf community in Togo face includes lack of qualified SLIs, lack of institutions that trains qualified SLIs, low capacity of the deaf community to participate in decision making at the level of state and within DPOs and low capacity of national leaders to effectively utilize existing legal frameworks to address exclusion and barriers that face the deaf. In addition, low level of knowledge among deaf people and wider community, emanating from lack of awareness creating has resulted in lack of access to public goods and services for the deaf.

Inadequate Sign Language interpretersAt the time of the assessment, 6 SLIs were in place in Togo. However, all the 6 SLIs are not formally trained as there is no single institute that trains SLIs in the Republic of Togo. Absence or inadequate qualified interpreters have deprived deaf people access to vital information, excludes them from accessing public goods and services and totally from participation in most decision making.

Sign LanguageThe Sign Language used by the deaf community in Togo was introduced by Mr. Andrew FOSTER2 back in late 1970’s. With 40+ years of evolution, the Sign Language used in Togo is now unique to Togo, a combination of ASL and local dialects/Francophone ASL as well as Signed Exact French. Sign Language is

2 A deaf American-Nigerian who studied at the Gallaudet University and upon his return to Africa established more than 30 schools for the deaf in West Africa in the 1960-70’s


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the medium of instruction in all Lomé schools for the deaf. However, the Sign Language is not officially recognized in Togo.

EducationThe first deaf school was opened by Mr. Andrew FOSTER in the heart of Lomé in October 1976 and presently directed by a hearing coordinator. This school has 3 deaf teachers and a deaf secretary and a deaf guard with approximately 115 deaf students. The school is run with financial assistance from a local church and several other NGOs. There are currently 7 schools for the deaf scattered all over Togo with one other small centre where deaf and other children with disabilities are placed in the same class. None of the schools are observed into the public education system.

The education system of deaf Togolese does not go beyond Junior High School and after Junior High School, deaf Togolese have to continue with their education in a hearing school. The majority of deaf students, who managed to pass their primary level exams, continue with hearing students in a local hearing secondary school without any support (i.e. SLIs, note-takers, tutoring and so forth). As a result, many of the deaf students in the hearing secondary schools drop out due to communication barriers and frustrations.

Capacity gapThe capacity of the AST to carry out comprehensive advocacy work in order to amplify the human rights needs of the deaf community has been particular weak. Lack of capacity to both carry out advocacy and mobilize support have resulted in inability to utilize existing legal frameworks to address exclusion of the Deaf in mainstream society and promote access to public goods and services.

Main challenges for the deaf in Côte d’IvoireWhile disabled people in general encounter barriers in Côte d’Ivoire, the deaf Ivoirians, in particular, encounter severe access barriers in education, employment, political participation and general access to information and social lives.

Lack of qualified Sign Language interpretersA key challenge the deaf Ivoirans face include lack of or inadequate SLIs and lack of interpretation services for most public goods and services. Like Mali, Niger, and Togo, there is no institution that trains SLIs in Côte d’Ivoire. The current individuals who support the deaf community either learn Sign Language from schools for the deaf, the deaf associations as well as religions institutions. The absence of SLIs have deprived deaf community of access to public goods and services and thereby weakens their advocacy capacity.

Low level of educational attainment, inadequate facilities in mainstream institutions, lack of or absence of qualified SLIs. The Côte d’Ivoire Sign Language is not officially recognised by the government as a language although SLIs are allowed in programmes that include deaf people.

Weak capacity to carry out advocacyAlthough the deaf community of Côte d’Ivoire recognizes a common association aimed at promoting and championing the human rights needs of the deaf in Côte d’Ivoire, the capacity of these national and regional leaders has been significantly weak. The limited capacity to carry out comprehensive advocacy work, lack of resources to carry out various intervention and low knowledge about their human rights fundamentally results in further exclusion. The capacity gap has resulted in inability to carry out right-based approach to advocacy and inability to effectively utilize existing legal framework to address exclusion.

Sign LanguageTwo Sign Languages are used by deaf Ivoirians: American Sign Language with features of Francophone are used in the education and deaf schools, and educated deaf adults and many deaf people, who had their education in deaf schools, communicate fluently in the ASL, although they also understand the local sign languages. The second form is a local Sign Language, which is used by deaf people with no formal education. There has been series of attempt to develop and document Sign Language dictionaries within the territories of Côte d’Ivoire. Although Côte d’Ivoire ratified the CRPD and its optional protocols, Sign Language is not officially recognized by the state as a language although it is allowed in public setting such


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as universities, deaf schools, and meetings with the aid of a SLI. The lack of recognition of sign language has deprived the deaf community of many opportunities.

EducationAlthough the state made an international commitment through the CRPD, Côte d’Ivoire currently has only one special school for the deaf located within Abidjan alongside a number of private schools managed by private individuals and churches. The school has facilities for primary up to Junior High School (JHS).

There are no special education arrangements for the deaf beyond JHS and deaf students who passed the public examination are compelled to join hearing Secondary High Schools for their secondary education. Within the hearing school, deaf students are not provided reasonable accommodation such as specially trained teachers or SLIs to enable them participate on an equal basis with their counterparts. Due to absence of support services, many deaf adolescents and students drop out of school or after JHS. Access to higher education by the deaf Ivoirians is problematic. The state and educational institutions does not provide SLIs for the deaf in universities. Deaf students in universities are therefore compelled to arrange their own interpreters in order to be able to participate in the teaching and learning process.

1.c General response to the challenges - who has done what until now?

NigerThere are two fundamental versions of Niger Sign Language dictionaries in circulation within the Republic of Niger. Initially, ASN developed a Niger Sign Language dictionary which included a lot of Hausa Sign Language in it however, the Ministry of Education along with UNICEF and USAID did not approve the first version. Ministry of Education, UNICEF and USAID created their own “Niger School Sign Language” dictionary which included a lot of LSF and ASL signs in it and it does not reflect the reality of Niger’s current Sign Language environment in the country.

As of 2016, the deaf schools continue using the government issued Sign Language dictionary and the authentic Niger Sign Language dictionary developed by ASN continues to be buried deep in the ASN office. The deaf community is beginning to split into two different Sign Language groups, those who use school signs mainly composed of LSF and ASL and those who use the authentic Hausa Sign Language. There is a huge need for intensive Sign Language research on Hausa Sign Language to protect the birth right of the native and indigenous Sign Language used in this country.

Between 2012 and 2016, AST, UNADAB, and ASN entered into partnership with support from the European Union and CBM through Handicap International (HI). The joint project trained and equipped over 400 deaf people from the three countries in various vocations and income generation activities. The program also saw the commencement of basic sign language training for interested individuals.

MaliVery few previsous interventions have been carried out by CSOs and NGOs as well as the association itself to address the exclusion and institutional capavity gap of the association. Between 2015 and 2016 for example, the International Services (Mali) carried out an organization capacity building project targeting selected DPOs including the Malian Federation for Persons with Disabilities Associations (FEMAPH). AMASOURDS have also worked with the FEMAPH in very few capacity building and training projects. and has a representative at the board members of FEMAPH.

In addition, other small scale interventions have been carried out in the past, albeit limited documentation of success made. For example, the association colloborated with the US Embassy in the past to promote interpretation of TV news for the deaf in the past. The association has also in the past partnered with a British organisation working on hearing aid clinic to provide hearing aid devices for qualified deaf people. Clarizen from the Netherlands Embassy also worked with the deaf school on building vocational training program while a LaSiMa research work has been carried out in partnership between the association and Dr. Nyst a situation that resulted in the production of a LaSiMa dictionary.


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A number of lessons have been learnt from past intervention. For example, a key observation is that almost all those interventions seek to address and meet the most basic needs of the deaf community. Little has been done to address the capacity gap and empower the deaf community to be able to carry out the necessary advocacy work. In addition, the short nature of those interventions have not provided ample opportunity for knowledge transfer and knowneldge sharing.

TogoIn response to the various challenges the Deaf Association of Togo face, AST has carried out a number of interventions in the past to address the most basic needs of deaf people in Togo. Some of these including capacity building project implemented by FETAPH in partnership with other disabled people organizations and Handicap International. The project sought to enhance the capacity of leadership of the various DPOs to be able to carry out series of interventions addressing the capacity gap among AST leaders with support from WFD.

The WFD has also carried out a two year capacity building project with AST and the Francophone countries. The project targeted organization assessment and capacity building for 19 countries of which AST has been critical part. The WFD project carried out organization assessment and built the capacity of the deaf community of AST through various training on leadership, project implementation, advocacy, resource mobilization and membership mobilization.

Between 2012 and 2016, AST, UNADAB, and ASN entered into partnership with support from the European Union and CBM through Handicap International (HI). The joint project trained and equipped over 400 deaf people from the three countries in various vocations and income generation activities. The program also saw the commencement of basic sign language training for interested individuals.

Côte d’IvoireWhile various interventions have been carried out in the past to improve the situation of deaf Ivoirians and other PWDs, reliable data on these previous interventions in the deaf community are difficult to come by.

The Abilis Foundation of Finland has for example played key role in leadership training for the youth in the past. The association has also partnered with Society Without Barriers to carry out comprehensive training and sensitization of deaf people in the CRPD. Several Sign Language research have also been carried out aimed at promoting Sign Language teaching in the various regions.

The aim of these interventions has been to address the poor socio-economic outcomes and improve access to information for the deaf.

There is dearth of data on the situation of the disability movement and CSOs, made up of DPOs such as Association of Persons with Physical Disabilities in Côte d'Ivoire, CBM, Society Without Barriers, and ANASOCI, have increased their presence in the past few decades. These organizations initiate projects and programs that advocate for the rights of individuals with disabilities on their rights. ANASOCI for example has been working with the deaf to advance their rights to Sign Language, access to information, employment, and social and political participation.

There is little information on national level efforts to promote the rights of PWDs in terms of economic, social and cultural rights as well as civil and political rights. However, in 2008, the government of Côte d’Ivoire initiated a policy to increase the level of economic participation of disabled Ivoirians through a special recruitment exercise to employ PWDs. An estimated 637 Ivoirians with disabilities were recruited to benefit from the said special policy into the public sector. It is however unclear the number of deaf people who were engaged during the special recruitment exercise.

So far a SL dictionary had been developed by an NGO (Society Without Barrier) in partnership with ANASOCI for use in deaf schools. At the time of the country assessment, a 2nd SL book had been developed for children and adults. The second book is not a sign language dictionary but general Sign Language book. A 3rd Sign Language book, called West African SL, has been drafted based on research from West African countries and is yet to be completed and printed for use. The 3rd one has signs from Côte d’Ivoire, Mali, Niger, Togo, and other Francophone countries.


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2. WHICH EXPERIENCE AND RESULTS DOES THE PROJECT BUILD UPON?

2.a Previous cooperation experience with the partner

A transnational cooperation between deaf associations in a region with similar cultures, traditions, languages, and structures has proven its efficiency in pushing the development forward, one of the oldest transnational cooperation between the deaf associations in the world are the cooperation between the deaf associations in the Nordic countries, which was established in 1907. The Deaf Nordic Council has served as a focal point of knowledge sharing supporting each associations in their work championing the rights of deaf people. This is one of the reasons that deaf people in the Nordic countries enjoyed a higher degree of inclusion in the society with accessible services, legal recognitions, etc. compared with the rest of the Europe and the world as well. With this project, we are trying to repeat the successful cooperation in the Nordic to a part of the Western Africa.

DDL and GNAD participated in the joint project strengthening the disability movement in Ghana, where the associations for the deaf, blind, physically disabled, and intellectual disabled participated together with their sister organisations in Denmark. One of the most important lessons learnt from the joint project is that the communication challenges, which deaf people faces, are a huge challenge for a full inclusion of the deaf association and its members in the disability movement. Thus it is paramount for the inclusion that deaf associations have both a solid capacity and access to skilled SLIs. As long as the deaf associations are not able to be fully included in the disability movement working together with and learn from the other organisations in their countries, the alternative is to learn from deaf associations in the neighbouring countries and organisational experts from abroad. GNAD is one of the most developed associations in the Western Africa, so this project will build on the experiences and knowledge present at GNAD supplied by new knowledge provided by DDL, WFD, and other relevant development partners; in addition to this the project will encourage a transnational cooperation and knowledge sharing between the associations in the Western and Central Africa with the WCARS in a role as facilitator of this cooperation and sharing.

While DDL and GNAD have worked together since 2007, this project is an enlargement of the cooperation inviting 4 other deaf associations (in Mali, Cote d’Ivoire, Togo, and Niger) and the WCARS into the partnership. The new partners are not unknown to neither DDL nor GNAD, as DDL has been involved in the WFD’s WCAR project from 2009 to 2012 as one of the donors through the Nordic cooperation, the main funder was SHIA. The pilot project commenced August 2008 and concluded April 2012. 19 countries participated in the project leading up to the establishment of the WFD WCAR Secretariat (WCARS) during the WFD World Congress in Durban, South Africa, July 2011. The evaluation carried out in Durban and the final report recommended a new project in the WCAR. Due to changed priorities, SHIA could not continue its financial support, thus WFD urged DDL to take over the responsibility to continue building on the foundations the pilot project made through basic capacity building and training. The project coordinator of the WFD-WCAR project is now development projects manager of DDL, so DDL has strong knowledge about the working environment in the WCAR, and the recommendations from the final report to SHIA as well as the country reports formed the base of the inception phase. Furthermore, GNAD is represented in the WCARS both as a member organisation and its president is one of the board members of the WCARS.

In 2013 the organizational capacity of GNAD has been assessed as a part of a partnership activity between GNAD and DDL, the findings of the assessment are that despite of some challenges, GNAD has capacity to carry out a project at this scale with additional trainings and counselling from DDL, which should be taken into account when determining the need for DDL’s participation in the activities of this project.

The former WCAR project involved 19 deaf associations in the Western and Central Africa, but this project will only focus on 4 target deaf associations geographically situated around Ghana (hereafter mentioned as TDA) due to a wish to focus on a limited number of countries allowing a more focused intervention.


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With these experiences as a backdrop, the partners embarked on an inception phase of the project cooperation lasting from January 1st 2016 to April 30th 2017 (HP 142-096). The inception phase is focusing on carrying out in-depth country assessments of the four participating countries, TDAs, and the deaf communities; testing the planned intervention models; ensuring involvement, commitment, and ownership of the TDAs; and finally share lessons learnt and agree on joint objectives and activities for this phase at a partnership workshop.

2.b Results

Through interviews and comparisions with the old organisation assessments from the previous WFD-WCARS project 2008-2012, which were carried out during the inception phase, the following changes from 2012 to 2016 have been observed in each of the TDAs:

ASN Increased capacity to network and initiate partnership: As a result of previous intervention, ASN

board members are now able to initiate new partnership with other institutions and organizations including CBM

Improvement in association statutes/bye-laws: ASN has redesigned statues and bye-laws with its mission and vision statements well documented and made visible for both the association and external stakeholders

Re-composition of board structure: ASN board structures have been re-composed. New approach to association management such as the introduction of and separation of administrative/staff from board members with division of labour clearly stated. There has been some change in the board size bringing it down to a manageable level.

Improved financial management capacity: ASN is now able to carry out basic financial management and book keeping within the association. Subsequently, the association has been able to continuously secure small grant for various projects.

AST Increased capacity to network and initiate partnership: As a result of previous intervention, AST

board members are now able to initiate new partnership with other institutions and organizations including the Embassy of the US for the provision of classroom blocks for the kindergarten department. Other key changes related to previous interventions include ability to collaboratively engage with NGOs/CSOs such as Plan International, CBM, and Konvoi.

Improvement in association’s statutes/bye-laws: AST has redesigned statues and bye-laws with its mission and vision statements well documented and made visible for both the association and external stakeholders

Re-composition of board structure: AST board structures have been re-composed. There is now a separation of staff from board members. Division of labour is clear now while roles and responsibilities are clearly stated

Improved financial management capacity: AST is now able to carry out basic financial management and book keeping within the association. Subsequently, the association has been able to continuously secure small grant for various projects.

Initiation of various activities: Celebration of International Week of the Deaf, participation in internal/regional sports events and participation in the observation of national and international days of persons with disabilities

AMASOURDS Increased capacity to network and initiate partnership: As a result of previous intervention,

AMASOURDS board members are now able to initiate new partnership with other institutions and organizations including International Services to carry out youth training program and organization assessment with other DPOs.

Improvement in association’s statutes/bye-laws: AMASOURDS now has a written and more improved statute/bye-laws with its mission and vision statements well documented and made visible for both the association and external stakeholders


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Change in board structure: AMASOURDS board structures has been re-composited. There is now separation of administrative/staff from board members with division of labour clearly stated.

Improved financial management capacity: There has been some notable changes in the management of association’s resources, a situation that enables the association to continue to receive support from various sources.

ANASOCI Increased capacity to network and initiate partnership: As a result of previous intervention,

ANASOCI board members are now able to initiate new partnership with other institutions and organizations including Abilis Foundation to carry out youth training program

Improvement in association statutes/bye-laws: ANASOCI has redesigned status and bye-laws with its mission and vision statements well documented and made visible for both the association and external stakeholders

Re-composition of board structure: ANASOCI board structures has been re-composited. New approaches to association management such as the introduction of and separation of administrative/staff from board members with division of labour are clearly stated.

Improved financial management capacity: ANASOCI is now able to carry out basic financial management and book keeping within the association. Subsequently, the association has been able to continuously secure small grant for various projects.

Initiation of various activities: Sports and observation of international days of disability.

The main results from the inception phase are: The WCARS and the 4 TDAs now have an in-depth assessment report using the Octagon model

with recommendations for future organisational development The partnership workshop in Ouagadougou strengthened the ties between the project partners

reaffirming each of the partners’ commitment to participate in the project and to share knowledge and experiences. Furthermore the workshop led to a joint decision on which areas of improvement, the next phase should focus on

A basic project website has been developed testing the viability of communicating through Sign Language. Despite the challenges of slow internet connections, the partners clearly expressed that it should be a high priority for the next phase to have information available in Sign Language in order to not exclude the less literate/illiterate leaders and members of their constituences

The ToT model has been tested in Togo confirming the viability of this approach, which the external evaluation paid particular attention to

Criteria for the selection of the TDT has been developed and six TDTs have been selected based on the criteria (Niger is still work in progress at the deadline of submitting this proposal)

An external evaluation has been carried out, the recommendations have been implemented in this very proposal

The inception phase carried out an Octagon assessment of each of the four TDAs and the WCARS, the Octagon scores are as following:

Table 2: Octagon scoresANASOCICôte d’Ivoire

ASTTogo

ASNNiger

AMASOURDSMali WCARS GNAD

GhanaIdentity 3.5 3.5 3.0 3.0 3.5 4.0Structure 3.0 3.0 3.5 3.0 4.0 4.5Implementation of activities 3.0 3.0 3.5 3.0 3.0 5.0Relevance of activities 3.0 3.5 3.0 3.5 4.0 4.5Professional skills 3.0 3.0 3.0 3.0 3.5 3.5Systems 3.0 2.5 3.5 3.5 3.0 4.5Acceptance and support 3.5 3.5 3.5 3.5 5.0 5.0External relations 3.5 3.0 3.0 3.5 3.5 4.0Note: GNAD’s octagon scores are from 2013, improvements are expected if a new assessment is carried out. Maximum score is 7.


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It emerges clearly from the scores that the capacity of the four TDAs and the WCARS are still low despite the small developments since 2012 and their weaknesses are very similar in nature. The use of the Octagon model for the organisational assessment led to a systematic and structured analysis of the challenges in each of the five organisations assessed. The assessments have among others concluded that despite the efforts of amending the statutes of the four TDAs, there are still loopholes and omissions in the statutes causing confusions about e.g. the role and responsibilities of the board members, the election procedures, and the AGMs – the confusions will have an impact on the TDAs to function effectively in the next phase, when they will undertake a greater role and responsibility of implementing the project’s activities, thus this phase should focus on solving these issues and capacity gaps. For more details please refer to the assessment reports (annexes G, H, I, J, and K).

2.c Challenges

The visits of the assessment team in each of the four countries reconfirmed the challenge of low literacy level among the board members and members at large hampering the opportunities of having a fluent communication in written French or English. The google translation proved to be an insufficient solution, partly due to the broken French in the communication from some of the board members of the TDAs. The PC should be a French speaking person allowing him/her to establish and maintain clear communication channels to the presidents of the four TDAs and not relying on other board members’ written French/English skills causing misunderstandings and delays in conveying information between the PC and the presidents.

A serious lack of access to qualified SLI in the four countries has been observed, the lack is most urgent in Mali and Niger, severly hampering the opportunities of the TDAs to effectively operate and interact with its surroundings. Furthermore, women are not well represented in the boards, with AST as a positive exception, accentutating the urgent need for women specific capacity building activities in this phase.

WCARS is lacking capacity both in terms of the skills of existing board members and in terms of availability of resources such as office space, staff for accounting, supervision, etc. making it unsuitable as a host of the project. Furthermore, the legal seat of WCARS is Cameroun, which is not one of the participating countries which may cause some unnecessary legal challenges to host a remote project office in another country. Thus the project and the project office are (still) hosted by GNAD.

While TDAs have made progress in developing statutes vis a vis vision and mission, they still need further development (definition of roles, democratic procedures etc.). Also, as shown by the Octagon analysis, basic governance needs to be followed up by building capacity for organizational management and systematic planning.

Finally but not least, the project experienced a major drawback by the loss of the PC in a fatal traffic accident. His laptop and pendrive for backup got lost in the accident together with the almost completed drafts of the country assessment reports and yet unsubmitted mid-term reports. The remaining members of the assessment team had to rewrite the country assessment reports from stratch using the information collected in each country, which the members fortunately had a copy of. A lot of knowledge, networks, and lessons learnt got lost together with the tragic departure of the PC, despite the efforts of the GNAD and DDL to minimise the adverse effects of the information gap.

2.d Learning of relevance to this application

This phase draws on lessons learnt from two past interventions, which are the WFD-WCARS project 2009-2012 and the inception phase 2016-17; and also on the DDL and GNAD partnership since 2007. The relevant recommendations and lessons learnt from the final evaluation of the WFD-WCARS project are:

The previous project carried out 2 x 2 weeks of training in each country, which was quite intensive for many of the participants to grasp all the new concepts. They expressed a wish of a higher number of shorter and less intensive trainings. Furthermore the trainers should stay in each country for a longer timespan than two times of two or three weeks. A further project should, given the


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budget and capacity constraints, focus on a fewer number of countries with similar challenges, language and culture instead of 19 different countries.

There were several issues that the National Association of the Deaf wished to be addressed by the trainers such like how to run a board meeting, conflict resolution and further information on the bilingual education or sign language. It was learnt through this project that in many associations there was a clear lack of basic knowledge on how to conduct meetings, write meeting minutes, draft statutes etc.

Capacity Building training (HOW and WHERE) - it became evident throughout the previous project that the majority of training participants would have liked to have more solid training in “how” and “where” to start with the information taught at the training. Again, the previous project would have benefitted from longer visits and training sessions with the deaf associations which would have allowed to examine these in more depth.

The “how and where” approach were carried out during the training for the newly elected board of the WCARS in Cameroun in January-February 2012. The trainings were held during the day, and then to practice working as a board the board had their board meetings in the evenings under observation and guidance of project trainers. The feedback from the board members was very positive, and they found this approach very beneficial ensuring a smooth execution of the very first board meeting of the WCARS.

Many of the board members mentioned that they would like to have somebody work with the association as a technical consultant for a good while to assist with for instance launching projects. The previous project tried to make sure that the follow-up phases between the training rounds would be carried out in an efficient way so that despite not being able to be physically present to support the deaf associations, constant contact will remain between the trainers and the target groups. However, written communication through emails have shown to be a challenge for many of the deaf associations due to limited literacy and/or lack of funds for paying for the internet access.

The majority of the board members are unable to read the power point presentations and often resort to memorising the colours or location of each concept. It became apparent to the trainers that there was a strong need for more sign language training materials along with visual images training materials in the power point presentations. Throughout the country visits, the trainers noticed that there is a very high rate of illiteracy among deaf community members which has a great impact on their employment opportunities and as well as association’s potential development as they often resort to few deaf leaders who can read and write to guide them.

The lessons learnt from the DDL and GNAD partnership are: It is crucial for the legitimacy of the deaf organisations as mouthpiece for the deaf people that the

leaders are held accountable for their actions, and the structure and division of responsibilities are clear.

If deaf people/organisations should be able to participate in the disability movements on equal terms with other PWD/OPWD, they should first be empowered, have sufficient leadership capacity, and have access to qualified SLI.

The lessons learnt from the inception phase and the recommendations from the external evaluation are: The inception phase reaffirmed the lessons learnt from the old WFD-WCAR project as mentioned

above The project should be less dependent on few persons, i.e. having more project staff, to mitigate the

risks of unexpected departure of key persons. On the other side, the new and lower budget limits set by Handicappuljen combined with the only one annual deadline for project proposals3 of this size are causing budgetary challenges

The pool of PCs meeting the requirements is limited in this region, the position should be split up into two positions attracting different applicant profiles (PC and PTO).

The ToT training of TDTs should be closely followed up by the PC/PTO offering coaching on site. The ToT training should also provide training on pedagogics and have practical training exercises

Basic training of SLIs in each countries should be carried out as a first step to have a pool of SLIs available enabling the associations to communicate with the governments and stakeholders

The training materials and core documents should be made accessible in SL to a wider audience3 For the next phase from 2020. From a budgetary standpoint this phase should ideally be just 28-30 months instead of 34.


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Small but valuable lessons learnt regarding the logistics of implementing activities in other countries has been collected by GNAD, such as how to improve the handling of foreign currencies, exchange rates, access to banking services, language challenges, etc.

2.e Preparatory process

After 2 years of communication between DDL and WCARS confirming each partners commitment to a continuation of the WFD-WCAR project confirming the feasbibility of such a partnership, a preappraisal workshop was carried out in Abidjan on January 19th – 24th 2014 with participation of representatives from WCARS and GNAD agreeing on project design, governance structure, activities and tentative budget. The agreements made during the workshop were based on the recommendations and lessons learnt from the final evaluation of the WFD-WCAR project. By subsequent advice from DPOD’s consultants, the project got cut down from 6 to 4 target countries (Benin and Burkina Faso were removed) and an inception phase should be carried out paving the way for this phase. As a part of the inception phase a partnership workshop was carried out in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso January 5th – 11th 2017, where the updated country assessment reports and recommendations were presented along with the preliminary findings by the external evaluator. The participants agreed on the focus areas of this phase leading to this very project proposal.

To sum up, the following documents are guiding the content of this phase: Final evaluation report of the WFD-WCAR project (annex M) Assessment reports of the 4 TDAs and of the WCARS (annex G, H, I, J, and K) Capacity assessment report of GNAD (annex L) Evaluation report of the inception phase (annex N)

3. WHAT CHANGE WILL THE PROJECT ACHIEVE AND HOW?

3.a Change

By the middle of 2020 the four TDAs are functioning as more effective organisations capable of carrying out various activities. Meetings are carried out regularly, communication and information are being shared both internally in the boards and externally with the members.

The leaders of the TDAs have a stronger understanding/knowledge of the purpose of the association, visions, missions, strategies, and action plans while they are leading the association more effectively in their capacities as board members with clearer division of role and responsibilities, so they are able to expand their work geographically in the next phase. The TDAs’ members are recognising their association as a legitimate organisation representing them and as able to meet their needs. By the end of 2019 key stakeholders in the four countries have been sensitised about SL and the International Week of the Deaf celebration in 2018 and 2019 have been used to raise awareness about deaf and SL in the four countries giving the TDA’s leaders an introduction to advocacy work laying out a foundation for advocacy work in the next phase.

By the middle of 2020 the TDAs have access to SLI with basic knowledge of SL enabling them to have a basic communication with their surroundings and enabling them becoming a part of the disability movement and to have a basic communication with government officials and relevant stakeholders or partners as a first small step to be more included in the societies. The deaf community and relevant stakeholders are aware of the existence of the SLIs through the SLI directories.

By the middle of 2020, the WCARS has strengthened its role and capacity as a regional secretariat – not just for the four participating deaf associations, but for all the 19 member associations in West and Central Africa


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giving this region a strong profile and voice both at the national, regional, and international levels attracting other donors.

By the middle of 2019 the learning platform and updated WFD Organisation Manual have been launched disseminating the knowledge, training materials, and experiences to a wider audience. The learning platform and manual are supporting the work of the 4 TDAs, GNAD, and WCARS – and other National Associations of the Deaf both in the WCAR and the rest of the world as well.

3.b Stakeholder analysis (which stakeholders are relevant to involve in the project and how?) and target groups (among whom will you achieve change?)

Table 3: Overview of the target groupsStakeholder Côte d’Ivoire Mali Niger Togo Ghana WCARS Sum

Primary target group: Right holdersBoard members 6 10 28 7 0 7 59Staff members 6 3 3 2 4 0 18Deaf community members 200 200 200 200 0 0 800

Secondary target group: Right holdersBoard members 0 0 0 0 9 0 9Deaf community members 400 400 400 400 400 1,000 3,000Other OPWDs 15 15 15 15 0 0 60

Primary target group: Duty bearersGovernment representatives, chiefs, etc. 15 15 15 15 0 0 60Other NGOs 15 15 15 15 0 0 60

Strategic partners: Organisations etc. who can support the TDAs in reaching the project’s outcomes and outputsOther NGOs 10 10 10 10 0 0 40Other development agencies 10 10 10 10 0 0 40

Strategic resources: Inputs necessary to achieve the project’s outcomes and outputsTDT 2 2 2 2 0 0 8SLI 10 10 10 10 0 0 40

Primary target group: Right holdersThe board members of the TDA will receive the major part of the trainings and counselling provided in the project by the TDTs in order to enable them to advocate for the rights and improvements in their countries themselves. All of the associations already have staff members employed mostly in voluntarily positions, they will receive trainings as well enabling them to do their work more effectively and in accordance with the new procedures introduced to the associations.

The deaf communities and members of the TDA are expected to participate in a few awareness raising activities such as the IWD to make them aware of their rights, so they can cooperate with the deaf associations when their rights are being violated and so they understand the importance of the work that the national associations are doing for improving their living conditions. This will strengthen the associations’ legitimacy among its members. Furthermore it would make it easier for the deaf associations to mobilize its membership when doing advocacy work, i.e. for rallies and petitions. The previous WFD-WCARS project did carry out community seminars equipping the local deaf communities in the capitals with basic knowledge about human rights and their organisations as a vehicle for change. In this project, we expect to reach at least twice as many deaf communities members as the previous project through both the planned awareness raising activities and activities related to the implementation of the LAF. Overall, a gender balance is expected to be observed in all the activities and a minimum of 25 % of the LAF funds are earmarked to women specific activities.

Secondary target group: Right holdersRepresentatives from other OPWDs will be sensitized about deaf issues e.g. through the celebration of the IWD and through other awareness raising activities, and probably through the LAF related activities.


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By providing a part of the training to the TDT, some of GNAD’s board members will benefit from the training through becoming more aware and sharp about the topics taught. This will also benefit the work in GNAD’s board to be reminded about “good habits” in running a national association of the deaf.

It is estimated that the awareness raising activities will indirectly benefit the double number of the direct beneficiaries. The learning platform will also reach parts of the deaf communities in the countries not directly involved in the project, as well as the deaf communities in other non-participating countries in the WCAR.

Primary target group: Duty bearersAs partners do not yet have capacity for strategic advocacy, focus in this project will be on developing techniques and approaches to advocacy and networking, with stakeholders being identified and approached on a case by case basis through short term action plans rather then being seen as strategic development partners. Government representatives will be the primary target group when celebrating the IWD in 2018 and 2019. Exactly which will be dependent on the topics for the IWD these years. Furthermore the relevant government representatives will be targeted through the awareness raising and basic advocacy activities, probably also as a target for a few of the LAF funded activities. The local chiefs play an important role in Togo and Côte d’Ivoire, thus they will also be targeted when relevant.

Other NGOs providing services in the participating countries will also be a target for the awareness raising activities, such as CBM and HI, ensuring that they will include deaf people in their programmes or change their policies to be more deaf friendly.

Strategic partnersWhile some of the NGOs are seen as duty bearers, they can also have the role as strategic partners supporting the TDAs in reaching their goals through their vast network and connections to the governments in the countries. The TDAs are expected to approach them during this phase strengthening the relationships with them, and maybe even carry out some activities together if the communication barriers can be overcomed.

There are a lot of development agencies working in the countries such as USAID and the embassies, which are or can become partners to the TDAs by providing funds, advices, support, and trainings to achieve the project’s objectives and the associations’ visions and missions.

Strategic resourcesA significant part of the trainings will be directed towards the 8 TDTs, which are seen as a cost-effective way to provide more frequent and less intensive training sessions in the countries in accordance with the recommendations from the previous project and the external evaluation of the inception phase.

Finally, the project will provide basic training to 4 x 10 SLIs in each country enabling the TDAs and the deaf communities in the capitals to have a basic communication with their surroundings.

Other beneficiariesThe intervention will indirectly benefit the deaf population in the WCAR consisting of an estimated total of 427,000 people by laying out the groundwork for the improvement of their living conditions and rights.

Furthermore GNAD and its members will benefit indirectly by the project as they also will take a part of the knowledge and experience exchange in the project and new knowledge brought into the project by external expert trainers as well as benefitting from the training materials and learning platform developed in this project, which can be used in GNAD’s other projects.

Finally, the learning platform will be accessible for all of WFD’s 133 member organisations in the world, where especially the Organisation Manual will be beneficial for most of them.

Stakeholder analysisPlease refer to annex B for a stakeholder analysis and description of the stakeholders.


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3.c Objectives and indicators

The development objective is: The national associations of the deaf in the participating countries are functioning effectively and are able to defend deaf peoples' human rights.

The immediate objectives are: 1. The leadership and management skills of the TDA are improved2. The 4 TDAs have increased their capacities to advocate for deaf people in their countries 3. An effective network and communication structure between the associations are established

enabling them to share knowledge and experiences

Please refer to annex C for a logframe.

3.d Strategy

The big pictureThe project’s strategy is to build on and consolidate what DDL and GNAD as well as the joint disability movement have developed in Ghana. The project office will be based in Accra at GNAD’s office premises. Ghana has been selected because of the existing cooperation between GNAD and DDL and because of its geographical location and stable political environment. In the long run, when the WCARS has gained sufficient capacity, it may become the host of the future project phase(s) funded by DDL/DPOD or other donors.

Based on the lessons learnt from the joint disability project in Ghana, the capacity of the deaf associations should be strong before they are able to participate in the disability movement as equal partners. With the lack of qualified sign language interpreters in mind, it is assumed that their benefit from participating in the national disability networks would be negligible. Thus the first step is to establish transnational networks with sister associations in other countries to exchange knowledge and lessons learnt on deaf people’s own terms and without communication barriers. The long term goal is that the deaf people are capable of participating in national disability networks on equal terms with qualified sign language interpreters.

As this project is the second phase of a longer planned intervention in the region, this phase will put its focus on setting up a foundation for the national associations of the deaf in the countries to be able to interact with its surroundings in the next phase. There will be a progression between the project years:

First year the project will focus on capacity building of the boards of the national associations enabling them to be run according to basic principles of transparency, accountability, and democratically. Their organisatonal structure and statutes will be reviewed to strengthen the foundation of the associations and bring them up-to-date with the situation and need in each country. The reviewed statutes will be approved by AGMs in each country giving the associations a legitimate suppot from its members and proper recognition and visibility by their respective governments. The WCARS board will be strengthened in their capacity as a regional cooperation body and to facilitate the transnational knowledge sharing.

Second year the project will strengthen the associations capacities to carry out activities such as International Week of the Deaf (IWD) and undertake at least one awareness raising activity each. The training of SLI will also commence during the second year. The WCARS will be strengthened by receiving secretariat support from the PC.

Third year the project will continue the activities from the second year and empower the national boards to identify which changes, they would like to see in their situations in the near future, i.e. identify the advocacy issues for the next phase, build new alliances with government agencies, and create platforms for resource mobilization for their core activities. It is expected that the increased visibility and capacity of the WCARS board will lead to the WCARS start working in the non-project countries on different levels.


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The third phase is expected to focus on advocacy work including Sign Language (rights to SL, research and knowledge about SL, and a more in-depth SLI training). Those activities require more strong and functioning deaf associations, which is the planned output of phase II. The capacity building of the associations and the WCARS will continue in phase III as well.

This project will also work on systematization of knowledge, learning processes, and training materials as a part of DDL’s strategy to systematise and streamline its development work to avoid repeating and reinventing things in every project. By letting other deaf associations benefit from the knowledge, experiences, and materials developed in DDL’s projects, the knowledge is disseminated to a wider audience than DDL and its project partners.

Outcome 1: The leadership and management skills of the TDA are improvedCapacity building strategyThe lessons learnt from previous project are that workshops lasting 1-2 weeks are insufficient; the trainers should stay longer in each country and practically show the associations how things should be done due to the low education levels of the deaf people in the countries. Thus the modus operandi of the project is workshops and “show-how” the things learnt should be applied in the real world in each country, the training methodology during the workshops is a mix of case based trainings, group works, role plays, and presentations by the TDT. The topics for the trainings of the TDA boards has been determined and agreed upon at the partnership workshop carried out in Ouagaduougou in the end of the inception phase. Based on the Octagon analysis of the 4 TDAs, it was agreed that the first series of capacity building trainings should focus on “Identity” and “Structure” to lay a solid foundation for the TDA’s future organizational development and work. The second series of capacity building trainings should focus on “Professional skills”, “Implementation of activities”, and “External relations” making the TDAs more experienced in carrying out activities. It was assumed that the three remaining variables of the Octagon model, namely “Relevance of activities”, “Systems”, and “Acceptance and support” will be positively influenced by improvements in the five variables. At the end of this phase, the Octagon assessments will be updated to measure the improvements made in this phase, it is the intention that the same team of assessors will give the updated Octagon scores ensuring consistency in the marks. The aim is that the trainings provided; updated statues, guidelines, manuals, etc.; and the subsequent desired change in behaviour should lead to the improvement of the five Octagon scores mentioned above by at least one point. It should be emphasized that the capacities of planning and strategic thinking of the TDAs are very low, so just the existence of action plans is a big step forward. They are not expected to be able to compile strategies in this phase.

The project will draw heavily on the lessons learnt in Ghana and the knowledge available at GNAD, both at the staff and the board members, which will be invited to provide trainings at the ToT trainings and to support the PC in his/her work with good advices when requested by him/her. The show-hows are showing how an activity can/should be carried out, step-by-step from start to end. By involving GNAD’s staff and board members, a higher degree of sense of ownership from GNAD can be obtained despite the fact that they are not among the project’s direct beneficiaries.

The communication structures within each TDA will also be strengthened through trainings, board meetings, and translations of relevant information and materials to SL, the latter in order to not exclude illiterate deaf (board) members. In order to ensure the ownership of the constitution and structure review process, the boards of the TDA will be involved in discussing the challenges, shortfalls, limitations, and loopholes in the current constitution/organisation structure. The TDT will have gained knowledge on “best practices” through training and joint analyses done as a part of the training, so they will be able to guide the TDA through the review progress. The amendments should be approved by the members through carrying out AGM in each country during 2018, where elections to the board will also happen if the terms of the current board members have to be renewed. All these are in order to ensure legitimacy, democracy, accountability, and transparency of the TDA.

As a part of the “show-how” training for the boards on “implementation of activities”, they will get the responsibility of managing the LAF after the 2nd round of trainings, which is a limited amount of funds for each association, 1,625,000 XOF4 per association during this phase. It has been agreed that minimum 25%

4 Approximately 18.500 DKK


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of the LAF must be spent on activities for women only to empower the women to become more active in the deaf associations. The boards must under supervision of the TDTs agree on what their annual LAF should be spent on, make a budget, get approval from the PC, monitor the spending, and finally submit semi-annual financial reports to the PC. This is seen as a practical way of clarifying the division of tasks/responsibilities in the board and is an exercise of maintaining transparency and accountability while strengthening the boards’ sense of ownership to the project. The outcomes and lessons learnt from the management and implementation of LAF activities will be shared with other associations during the annual Project Forum meetings. With this experiences learned, it will be easier for them to embark on other projects funded by other donors.

Outcome 2: The 4 TDAs have increased their capacities to advocate for deaf people in ther countriesAdvocacy and awareness raising strategyThe raison d’être of the deaf associations is to be able to bring changes for its members. Advocacy work is the core activity of bringing changes and development. Thus this project will through a training session on basic advocacy introduce the TDA to advocacy work. The exact basic advocacy and awareness raising activities will take the capacities of the TDA into account and be based on the experiences at GNAD of doing advocacy work in an similar context. Celebrating International Deaf Week is seen as an obvious opportunity and cause for undertaking an awareness raising activity aimed at the deaf community in 2017 and with the increased capacity of the TDAs scale this up to be targeted at the general public in 2018 while also inviting representatives from the other DPOs and the governments to sensitise them about the deaf issues. The exact theme of the week is announced by WFD every year. This small improvement in advocacy skills and visibility is assumed to give the TDAs a higher degree of confidence to be more involved in the disability federations and the increased visibility should lead to the situation that the TDAs are more often invited to meetings at the government and other stakeholders regarding matters relevant for the deaf. But their increased participation is dependent on SLI, see the paragraph below.

Strategy for SLI trainingFinally, the associations’ ability to undertake advocacy work is closely related to access to qualified SLI; without SLI the associations are not able to communicate with their surroundings and the duty bearers. Thus this project will undertake an activity with the aim of identifying and training SLI and publish a small directory of SLI available and trained in each country enabling the associations and the deaf to have a basic communication with their surroundings when needs arise (both by the deaf and the governments) and to advocate their governments for a sustainable long term solution; both the basic trainings and SLI directories can be seen as advocacy tools for a better understanding of the importance of and need for qualified SLIs among the governments.

This should not be seen as a full-scale SLI training programme, but just a mere first step to a long-term and comprehensive solution to the problem of the lack of qualified SLIs. GNAD has started a SLI training programme in cooperation with the University of Cape Coast, the future phases will draw on the experiences from Ghana and the small scale trainings in the four countries as well to design and advocate for a more comprehensive SLI training programme in the four countries, which could be in cooperation with GNAD and the University of Cape Coast.

Outcome 3: An effective network and communication structure between the associations is established enabling them to share knowledge and experiencesStrategy for knowledge sharingThe existing regional body of cooperation, the WCARS, is expected to play a pivotal role in facilitating the transnational cooperation and networking between the countries. The project will take advantage of the fact that the SL of the literate deaf people in all the five countries due to historical reasons are based on American Sign Language easing the face-to-face communication between the countries, the TDT, and the Project Forum members. The PC and PTO to be employed at GNAD should be bilingual in both English and French.

Apart from the meetings and workshops at WCARS facilitating a systematic and recurring sharing of knowledge and experiences, there will be study visits to the deaf association, deaf schools, and relevant places during the annual Project Forum meetings (one of them will be held in Accra visiting GNAD) and the


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learning platform will serve as a centre for learning and disseminating knowledge beyond this project benefiting many other deaf associations and development projects worldwide.

The project will equip each participating associations and the WCARS with a small website built on WordPress to train the associations about communication and public relations, both to their members and to the stakeholders. Since all the websites are based on same (easy to use) technical platform, they can help each other to maintain the websites during and after the project. The trainings to maintain and update the website will also be cheaper. WordPress is selected due to its ease of use, it is free, and it is available in both English and French.

Strategy for the learning platformThe learning platform will also be a focal point of collecting and sharing lessons learnt in the five countries, so the other deaf associations can learn from and replicate the successes achieved by GNAD and the four TDAs through case studies and success stories. It is planned that DDL’s other projects will contribute to the continued development of the learning platform with their lessons learnt, case studies, success stories, and materials developed – as well as translations of the already developed and relevant materials to their own written and signed languages.

WFD has an organisation manual from 1994 written by the late Raija Moustgaard, the 160-pages manual is due for an update despite of its other qualities. It lacks information about rights based advocacy, deafhood, updated information on Sign Languages from recent research in this field, the CRPD, Agenda 2030, and so on. An updated manual translated to French and sign languages will constitute the core of the learning platform. The materials the TDT are developing during their ToT sessions will also be available at the learning platform. The platform will be a combination of electronic and printed materials. To cope with the slow and/or unstable internet connections outside the capitals, it will be possible for the PC and TDTs to download the electronic materials to an USB stick or DVD for distribution among the board members of the branches. DDL will be the lead on the updating of the organisation manual working with a working group (MWG) consisting of people with experiences from organisation and/or development work, researchers, advocates, etc. in order to bring the latest and adequate knowledge to the work with the manual. The exact division of tasks, the extent of the update, and the need of employing external contributors/editors/writers will be decided on the first meeting in the MWG. The still “valid” parts of the manual will be translated to French/SL and be used in the capacity building of the TDA to avoid having the PC, PTO, and TDT reinventing the wheel once again. The updated parts of the manual will be tested with the TDA in 2017/18. The experiences collected from the manual and learning platform will be utilised in the next phase of this project and other future projects of DDL. The updated manual and learning platform will be launched at the WFD World Congress in Paris in July 2019 to gain maximum visibility of some of the tangible results of this project phase. This attention will probably attract other deaf associations in the North to work with the other member countries of the WCARS based on the materials and lessons learnt in this project provided through the learning platform.

Strategy for regional cooperationWhen the PTO has been employed, the PC will be able to provide secretariat support to the WCARS improving its services and communication with the other non-participating member organisations in the WCAR as the WCARS currently are very dependent on the voluntarily work done by some of the WCARS board members. Thus it will strengthen the visibility and ability of WCARS as a regional body of cooperation.

The capacity building of the TDAs will be continuously evaluated through the project monitoring at annual Project Forum meetings, which will take place before the ToT sessions in order to ensure an opportunity for the ToT sessions to be responsive to the evolving training needs of the TDA.

Finally the training of the WCARS board in order to become more sharp on its role as facilitator for the regional cooperation and knowledge sharing will be carried out by experienced deaf leaders at regional level from e.g. DDL, WFD, and RSESA (WFD Regional Secretariat for East and South Africa) since the knowledge of deaf issues and cooperation at regional level is not available in Ghana and Western Africa. The topics to be trained are expected to be about communication; advocacy; human rights, CRPD and Agenda 2030; and fundraising – which are the areas the TDAs expect that WCARS should focus its efforts


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on as a regional cooperation body, this was clearly expressed at the partnership workshop in Ouagadougou January 2017. Based on this expectation, there will be a joint training on fundraising during the 2nd Project Forum meeting in 2019, apart from the usual participants, each of the TDA can send additional representative, who is responsible for the fundraising (such as the treasurer or one of the staff members). The other member associations of the WCARS can invite the WCARS board members to their countries to provide training on the topics, they have been trained through this project.

Cross-cutting outputs Three kinds of activities support implementation of the project in a cross cutting way. These are training of deaf trainers (TDTs), creation of a learning platform to support the TDTs and capacity building in GNAD to improve its contribution the the the project. They all exemplify implementation strategies, i.e. they serve to create the conditions that will enable several other outputs to be achieved. Instead of adding them to the activity lists of the outputs they support, they are formulated as separate cross cutting outputs helping the project management to maintain focus.The most important of these outputs are the TDTs. Strategy for the TDT trainings (ToT)Based on the recommendations from the previous project and the evaluation report from the inception phase, this project will employ the ToT approach making it possible to have two TDT in each country throughout the whole period enabling a more frequent training of the board and membership. This is also seen as a cost effective way to disseminate knowledge to a wider audience in the countries compared with having a team of expert trainers travelling around all the time.

The training of the TDT will draw on the experiences from the former WFD-WCARS project, the recommendations in the country reports re. the topics and issues to be trained, and the recommendations in the evaluation report presented at the partnership workshop in Ouagadougou. The latter recommended that the TDT should also be trained in pedagogy and there should be given sufficient time to each training topics. It is also recommended that the PC should observe the TDT when they are providing trainings in their own countries giving them feedback and support.

The selection of the TDT has been done in an open, non-discriminatory, and transparent selection process involving both the PC and TDA ensuring a high degree of ownership and acceptance by both the TDA and the membership to the project’s key actors in the countries. The ownership and acceptance of the TDT will contribute to the motivation of the TDT to work for the project during all three years. The TDT should not interfere with the day-to-day business of the TDA to maintain impartiality and credibility. Please refer to annex R for the selection criteria and CVs of the selected TDTs.

DDL will participate in the first ToT training to promote the values of transparency, openness, team work and spirit, democracy, diversity, and anti-corruption. Values which are important for building trust and good working relationships between the PC and TDTs, and internally between the TDTs, which are imperative for a successful implementation of the project by it’s key actors.

Due to the high prevalence of illiteracy among the board members and membership, the training materials produced by the project will be based on the national sign languages and use visual elements, which is more time consuming to produce compared with training materials based on text only justifying the extended periods of ToT workshops for the TDT. During the 1st ToT session in Lomé, there will be a study trip to Accra visiting GNAD giving the TDT an opportunity to see how a well functioning deaf association like GNAD is working through interactions with and presentations by members of GNAD’s staff and board. The TDT will also participate in one of GNAD’s board meetings to observe how a board meeting should be carried out. The TDT will have a Q&A session with the board members after the meeting to ask questions and get a deeper understanding of the running of GNAD from the board’s perspective. The other participating countries will host the 2nd and 3rd training according to the recommendation from the external evaluator to enable the TDT to also learn from the strengths of the TDA in the host country.

The training methodology of the TDT will be a mix of case based training, group work, presentation of expert trainers and the PC, role play, production of training materials, and hands-on training (i.e. actually try to give a training on the topics, they just learned to a “test-audience”). While the PC is expected to do the major part


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of the 1st ToT training with assistance of experienced colleagues at GNAD and DDL, the project is dependent on an additional trainer for 2nd and 3rd training, this person will have attended the Frontrunners leadership training programme 5 6 at Castberggård and join the project in the middle of 2018 bringing updated knowledge about deaf issues, human rights, advocacy, leadership, and management to the project.

The PC, and from the middle of 2018 the PTO too, will do follow up visits in the field between each ToT session in order to guide, coach, and give feedback to the TDT and to monitor and evaluate the progress of the activities. Since written French is not the first language of the TDT and the board members/memberships of the TDA, it is imperative to have the opportunity to have face-to-face contact between the PC and the TDT/TDA/memberships apart from the contacts through video calls in Skype. The regular feedback from the PC and PTO is also a way of motivating the TDT.

3.e Risks

AssumptionsOutcome 1:

The deaf leaders at the national level are motivated to participate in the trainings and to work voluntarily for their organisations

The partner organisations are ready to be transparent and democratic The memberships are interested and motivated to participate in an organisation for the deaf

Outcome 2: The leaders are willing and confident to participate in advocacy and awareness raising activities The authorities and general public are willing to be sensitized and collaborate with the TDA

Outcome 3: There exists willingness and capacity in the partner organisations to participate fully in the Project

Forum and to share knowledge and experiences

RisksPlease refer to annex D for a risk assessment.

3.f Monitoring, documentation and learning

The monitoring system will be based on the set of indicators and the baseline data to measure the process towards the results and outcomes in the LFA (see annex C) and serve as an important monitoring tool for both the PC, PTO, TDT, the boards of the TDA, GNAD, WCARS, and DDL. The M&E system will be completed in the beginning of the project.

It is the responsibility of the board of the TDA and the TDT to be in close contact to the PC and PTO. The PC/PTO will undertake at least two monitoring visit to the countries per year (in addition to the regular communication through emails and Skype) ensuring that information flow and reporting of activities follow project implementation plans and to update the indicators. The GNAD director will monitor the day-to-day work of the PC and the PTO.

Project visits will be carried out by DDL once a year (expected to be in conjunction with the annual M&E meeting with the WCARS), and DDL will be informed about the ongoing progress of the project through quarterly reports, updates, and other reports. This will provide DDL’s development project manager a sound basis for assessing developments and achievements in a dialogue with GNAD. Despite the regular communication between DDL and GNAD/PC, it may be a risk that there are too many links between DDL and the project activities causing DDL becoming less responsive to the challenges in the implementation of the activities and the situation in the four TDAs. This will be a special point of attention after the first monitoring visit to evaluate if this setup works as desired – and change the setup if necessary.

5 The late PC attended this leadership programme before he was employed6 The costs of PTO’s participation in the Frontrunners will be applied for in a separate F4 application to be submitted in March 2017


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The annual M&E meeting at the Project Forum will assess the strategies and structure of the project and to ensure relevant adjustments can take place, e.g. adjusting the annual ToT sessions to become more responsive to the (evolving) needs of the TDA. A final evaluation will be carried out in the middle of 2019 with respect to the deadline for submission of a proposal for the next phase.

Systematization of experiencesDuring the project period there will be systematization of experiences at different levels:

Between the TDT primarily during the ToT trainings, where they will share their experiences of training the leaderships and members in their countries. Between the trainings, it is expected that the TDT will maintain contact with each others through SMS or video calls. The follow up visits by the PC will contribute to this systematization and be mentioned in the quarterly reports.

In the Project Forum and WCARS where the major part of the knowledge sharing and experience exchange will take place. The meetings will reflect on the experiences and challenges emerging during the implementation of the trainings and the activities. The reflections will lead to recommendations for the way forward for the project – and for other initiatives in the WCAR outside the project. The success stories from the project will be published on the project’s websites and other relevant channels. The next phase of the project is supposed to build on the experiences from this project.

Finally, the experiences gained in this project will be reflected in the training materials developed and published at the learning platform. The organisation manual will also be updated based on the experiences, e.g. by having a few case studies based on this project.

3.g Information work

The overall objective of the planned information work in Denmark is to enhance the public awareness on the living conditions of deaf people outside Denmark and to inform about DDL’s engagement in development cooperation work in order to raise general understanding and support to the development work among DDL’s members.

The information funds from this project will be pooled together with information funds from other projects to enable a coordinated information work across the projects. The following outputs are planned for all the development projects in the period 2017-2020 (depending on the funds available in the pool):

A thematic inset in DDL’s membership magazine Døvebladet about development work Articles in DDL’s membership magazine Døvebladet mentioning the progress and achievements in

the different projects News published at DDL’s webpage mentioning the progress and achievements in the different

projects Two or three broadcasts at Tidens Tegn, an one-hour long show in Danish SL currently aired every

Saturday morning on DR2 telling about the projects and the living conditions of deaf people in the countries, DDL are working in

At least three information meetings (“fyraftensmøder”) for the members about the development work of DDL both in Copenhagen and in the Jutland

Involvement of ‘development ambassadors’, a group of volunteers in the ‘Development Committee’ responsible for informing DDL’s members about the development work (please refer to DDL’s ‘Development Profile’). They will participate in some of the annual monitoring visits to DDL’s projects and tell the good stories from their own perspective.

The development project manager at DDL will be the person responsible for the coordination and implementation of the information work. The information officer and editor of Døvebladet will be responsible for the components regarding the website and Døvebladet. The broadcasts at Tidens Tegn will be produced in cooperation with Døvefilm, the broadcast company producing this TV show for DR2.


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Furthermore the project will produce at least one article per year to the WFD Newsletter in order to inform the deaf communities in the world about the achievements of the project and the development of the associations.

The expected outcomes of the information work is that the development work of DDL gains increased understanding and support from its members and the members become more sensitized about the living conditions of deaf people in developing countries.

3.h Setup – division of roles and responsibilities between partners

Please refer to annex P for an explanation of the project organisaiton and division of roles and responsibilities between the partners.

3.i The budget explained

Does the budget include spending on the Danish organisation’s man-hours dedicated to activity-specific assistance?

x

YesNo

Overall, the budget allocation is: 59 % to activities, 3 % to investments, 9 % to local staff, 3 % to local administration, 6 % to project monitoring, 3 % to evaluation, 1 % to information work in Denmark, 6 % to budget margin, 3 % to disability compensation, 1 % to audit, and 7 % to administration in Denmark. Since the partnership still is in its infancy, the support to core cost of each associations is limited. There will only be paid staff members at the project office within GNAD in order to ensure sustainability of this phase. The TDTs will be paid a daily allowance, when they are participating in the project’s activities.

The distribution within the activity budget of 1,629,499 DKK is: 18% to outcome 1 on capacity building of the TDAs, 20 % to outcome 2 on advocacy and awareness raising including training of SLIs, 25 % to outcome 3 on regional cooperation and knowledge sharing, and 37 % on outputs contributing to several outcomes (training of TDTs, development of learning platform, etc.). The training of TDTs and development of learning platform is a relatively high start up cost within this phase and is expected to be relatively less in the future phases, it should be seen as an investment for both this and future phases, and DDL’s other projects as well.

The regional cooperation and knowledge sharing also claims a relatively big part of the budget because of its nature, it is not exactly cheap to have a number of people traveling to one place and having meetings for one week. This is deemed necessary to meet up once a year to establish relationships and networks between all the partners. Skype meetings are still not technically feasible in this region.

One of the main reasons for the relatively cheap trainings of the boards is that almost all of the board members live in/near the capitals minimising the costs to transport and accommodation. It may change in the future when the associations are expanding their work geographically and are having a geographically more broad representation in their boards.

Due to the unfortunate passing away of the former PC and with him all the knowledge and experiences, DDL has to be heavily involved in the trainings until a PTO has been trained in Denmark and employed by the project, which is expected to happen July 2018. DDL will provide training to the WCARS board on communication; human rights, CRPD, and Agenda 2030; and advocacy as a part of output 3.1 since neither GNAD nor the forthcoming PC are expected to have this deep knowledge about these issues, especially on the CRPD and Agenda 2030.

DDL will also provide some of the training at the first ToT training (output 4.1) ensuring a proper kick-off of the project and transfer of good (Danish) values, such as transparency and anti-corruption, please refer to


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the strategy on the TDT training. Furthermore DDL will use the opportunity to make sure that the financial management of the expenses in the four participating countries is sound and according to the guidelines.

DDL will lead the development of the learning platform (output 4.2) since DDL has the full picture of the training materials available and has most of the experiences with development work and capacity building of national associations of the deaf among the partners in this project. Furthermore, DDL has the knowledge about building a website from a technical and communicative perspective. By leading this work, DDL can ensure a high quality of the materials produced and that the learning platform is prepared to meet the needs of DDL’s other development projects gaining synergies across the projects.

4. WHAT ARE THE PROSPECTS AFTER THE PROJECT?

4.a How to ensure sustainability

Organisational sustainabilityThis project will support the partner organisations’ work, so they become more professional with an improved management structure, stronger leaders at the national and local level, the organisations will get more clear communication channels, both internally and externally with the members – and in the long run with the society, they are a part of. The trainings the leaders will receive during the project will ensure that they will be able to continue organizing deaf people and to operate the organisations after the project activities have ended. The introduction of a small fee as membership dues can help secure commitment of members and organizational sustainability. There will also be trained new leaders and by this more deaf people in the organisations will achieve knowledge about how to organize and lead an organisation. Focus is also on the active participation of deaf women, gender balance will be maintained throughout the project.

The improvement and consolidation of financial and management structures, establishing of monitoring tools and production of guidelines and manuals will lead to a clearer and more transparent management mechanism of the organisations, which is expected to continue after the project phases has come to an end. This will increase the organisations’ capacity to fundraise for local funds and seek support from international donors, which are in accordance with the experiences from Ghana.

Awareness raising and advocacy are other important parts of the intervention in the long run. These activities, which are planned to have a significant part of the activities in the forthcoming phases, will lead to improved capacity in advocacy among the organisations allowing the organisations to collaborate with the local authorities and OPWDs leading to increased recognition of deaf peoples’ concerns and issues. The capacity to work with authorities and other OPWDs will remain and support the organisations after the end of this intervention.

The selection of the countries participating in the project has been done with the sustainability in the mind, they all are countries bordering to Ghana and each other’s allowing for a quite easy and relatively cheap travelling around improving the chances that the national associations are able to continue to cooperate across the country borders after the project has concluded. In addition to that the cultural, societal, and political environment is somewhat similar among those countries making it more relevant for the countries to learn from each other. The language difference may be a challenge, but in these days of technology, translations from English to French and vice versa can easily be done. Also it is not imperative that the only Anglophone country (Ghana) is an active part of the transnational exchange after the project, the primary goal is that all the other Francophone countries are doing it.

Financial sustainabilityThis project is the first phase of a long-term multi-phased intervention, the long-term goal of financial sustainability of the organisations is ensuring donor diversification. Currently none of the 4 TDA are supported by the Danish Disability Fund. All the 4 TDA are getting small financial support from various sources, e.g. the government, foreign donors, and through membership dues. This phase will not fund the TDA’s core costs directly (apart from the AGM and board meetings), so the financial dependency will be insignificant. WCARS has succeeded in fundraising for a few board meetings and one training in the last 4


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years from local and foreign donors. The rates used in this project as agreed upon during the preappraisal workshop will contribute to maintaining economic awareness. The project will only reimburse documented expenses and not pay sitting allowances etc. to promote a culture of volunteerism.

In this phase there will be one joint training on fundraising, which will contribute to the TDA’s skills and opportunities to raise funds from other sources. The financial sustainability is a high priority and will be on the agenda throughout this project.

4.b New phases and future cooperation

This project is the first phase of a long-term intervention. The long term goal is that the TDA have increased their organisational capacities, are able to advocate for the human rights of the deaf people, and are participating fully in the disability movement in the countries, that the deaf people have access to skilled SLIs, and finally that the TDA are serving as a role model for the other deaf associations in the Western and Central Africa encouraging them to set up similar cooperations. The future phases may work with expanding the TDA’s geographical coverage such as strengthening the existing branches or opening new branches in the other regions/districts; design a full scale SLI training programme and advocate for it to be included in the existing training institutes in the countries; and to advocate for a more deaf friendly education system in the participating countries.


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3. Budget summaryPlease provide a summary of the main budget items.

A detailed budget with notes must be submitted in an annex using the ‘B-E Budget format’, in which tabs 1-4 must all be filled in. In case you are applying for disability compensation, this must be set out in a separate tab in the budget format.

See also DPOD’s “Guide to the preparation of budgets for the Danish Disability Fund” (in Danish).

Main budget items: Financing planFull amount Of this, from the

Disability Fund Of this, from other sources

1. Activities 1.810.099 1.810.0992. Investments 79.000 79.0003. Expatriate staff 0 04. Local staff 287.000 287.0005. Local administration 86.000 86.0006. Danish project monitoring 185.000 185.0007. Evaluation 98.500 98.5008. Information in Denmark (max. 2% of 1-7) 45.000 45.0009. Total project expenses (budget line1-8) 2.590.599 2.590.59910. Budget margin (min. 6% and max. 10% of 9) 177.736 177.73611. Disability compensation 82.600 82.60012. Auditing in Denmark 30.000 30.00013. Subtotal (Budget line 9-12) 2.880.935 2.880.93514. Administration in Denmark (max. 7% of 13) 201.665 201.66515. Total (Budget line 13+14) 3.082.600 3.082.600

Note: Exchange rate used: 1 XOF = 0,0114 DKK


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4: Cross-cutting issuesPlease fill in the information on cross-cutting issues against an assessment of what share of the budget for this application is allocated to each concern. In the fields entitled “weight”, you indicate the percentage that each cross-cutting issue takes up in the total budget. These figures should merely be based on an estimate, and not on exact calculations.

Please note that the total allocations may well exceed 100%, as specific initiatives may address several cross-cutting issues simultaneously, so that funds allocated in favour of women’s conditions may also contribute to environmental improvements.

Even though Denmark gives priority to these issues being integrated into development work, it must be stressed that this exercise is not about reporting as high percentage weights as possible. For instance, you may write 0%, if it is not clearly documented that specific costs are incurred by promoting the concern in question in the activities.

Cross-cutting issues addressed by the project applied for as percentages of budget spending

Gender Environment Good governance and human rights

HIV/AIDS Reproductive, maternal, neonatal and child health (RMNCH)

Weight (%) Weight (%) Weight (%) Weight (%) Weight (%)20 % 0 % 100 % 0 % 0 %

Key words for cross-cutting issues:

Gender: Equal rights (political, civil, economic and social rights, including sexual and reproductive as

well as cultural rights) for women and men. Equal access to and control over resources for women and men. Equal opportunities to obtain political and economic influence for women and men.

Good governance and human rights: Transparent and responsible management of human, economic and financial resources. For the purposes of just and sustainable development. In a political and institutional environment which upholds human rights, democratic

principles and rule of law.


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5. Annexes

i. OBLIGATORY ANNEXES

A. Updated ‘Partner Profile’ (for South partner(s))B. Stakeholder analysis C. LFA D. Possibly a risk assessment (only required in the case of D applications)E. Possible Terms of Reference for activity-specific assistance.F. Budget format

ii. SUPPLEMENTARY ANNEXES

Annex no. Annex titleG Assessment report of Côte d’IvoireH Assessment report of TogoI Assessment report of NigerJ Assessment report of MaliK Assessment report of WCARSL Assessment report of GNADM Final WFD-WCARS reportN Inception phase evaluation reportO List of acronymsP Project organisationQ LAF guidelinesR TDT selection criteria and CV


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