Bangladesh - Belgium

Citizens’ Voice and Accountability Evaluation – Bangladesh Country Case Study
The National Poverty Reduction Strategy (NPRS) has been important for MOF budgeting, providing
a policy framework against which the MOF can analyse and allocate budgets. The FMRP has
supported the MOF in developing line ministry capacity and linking the NPRS to the Medium Term
Expenditure Frameworks (MTEFS).
Sustainability
One of the identified weaknesses of the RIBEC projects was lack of sustainability with regard to staff
turnover (through frequent transfers) and lack of provision for equipment maintenance. FMRP was
designed to improve sustainability through:
• prior agreements with the Ministry of Establishments about securing staff and staffing stability
during programme implementation
• continuing the practice of training trainers
• obtaining undertakings for the maintenance and replacement of equipment
• securing continuity of the existing training courses in the Financial Management Academy; and
• encouraging more demand (from civil society and parliament) for better quality financial
information.
The FMRP reports a significant step towards greater sustainability during the bridging period
between RIBEC and FRMP where Finance Division agreed to manage all the activities of the
programme and made funding provision from the development budget.
Lessons Learned
1. Voice/Accountability models can seem simplistic and naïve in a highly charged political economy
context where gains are small, long-term and incremental. There is no simple technical fix for
political cultural embedded norms.
2. There is a significant distinction between “internal” (parliamentary and other) accountability
mechanisms and “external” (civil society) accountability:
2.1. Internal accountability has voice and accountability mechanisms inbuilt which can be tackled.
The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) is, however, highly politicised and faces a backlog of
accounts. No one wants to examine recent audits which can be used to accuse party members of
poor performance; as a result accounts can be delayed for 5-6 years at which point they are
irrelevant.
According to the Auditor General’s Office (AGO) there are 825 reports from the AGO lying unread
with the PAC because of the suspension of parliament under the caretaker government. As a result,
Government liabilities have been blocked. The AGO proposed in July that a temporary PAC be
established (i.e. until Parliament restarts), with citizen representatives, in order to keep the pipeline
moving, but the AGO has yet to receive a reply. Apparently the speaker is blocking this initiative
because he thinks that it isn’t constitutional.
Parliamentary reform needs to ensure that the Accounts Committee is “well fed and well led”; i.e.
that it has good and timely information from the AGO and has a good secretariat with competent
staff and chairperson. The AGO reports that the Accounts Committee is well fed but that
competence is presently lacking because of political agenda and activities. It is important to
remember that Parliament did not have a public accounts committee for years because of military
rule.
2.2. External accountability is complicated by tense relationships between government and nongovernment
stakeholders: The MOF exhibits antipathy towards NGOs, is suspicious of their motives
and doesn’t see them as representing a broader non-agenda constituency. For this reason attempts
to engage the Line Ministries to consult with civil society have, according to one key informant, been
“aspirational rather than reality”. The AGO comments that while the donors are very keen to get civil
society oversight of the AGO reports, this is very sensitive because there is no provision under the
constitution for this type of oversight.
3. Civil society engagement with budgets needs to be achieved earlier if it is to exert leverage. At
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