Accountability ToolKit

Accountability Toolkit Rollout

In late 2021 Women4GlobalFund (W4GF) kicked off the implementation of its community-led monitoring and feedback Accountability Toolkit in Cameroon, India and Tanzania as a pilot project. The W4GF Accountability Toolkit supports women health and human rights advocates to:

  • conduct independent, community-led monitoring and tracking of Global Fund–supported programmes and services to assess the effectiveness of services, including by gathering client perspectives;
  • ensure that countries take the right steps to achieve gender equality and uphold human rights by highlighting what is/is not working well in Global Fund–supported programmes and services and advocate to reprogramme and scale up programmes and services that are effective; and
  • build and strengthen strategic partnerships between communities and the organizations and institutions implementing the grants, which is essential to enable women to remain meaningfully engaged and to assess their own effectiveness as W4GF advocates in Global Fund processes at the national level.

Country Selection

The criteria for country selection included:

  • W4GF long-standing connections to W4GF advocates who are actively engaged in the CCM and national processes;
  • W4GF advocates willing and committed to implementing the Accountability Toolkit and seeing this as an extension of their work;
  • Global Fund priority countries that receive matching funding related to gender. These could include adolescent girls and young women; human rights (addressing gender-based violence); addressing gender and TB;
  • Efforts on community-led monitoring already underway.

Selection of the W4GF Accountability Toolkit Implementation Group

W4GF selected 10 women from diverse communities in Cameroon, India and Tanzania to conduct this work, with special effort to engage networks of young women; women living with HIV; sex workers; transgender women; women who use drugs; and networks of TB advocates and malaria. In addition, a lead organisation has been selected in each country from the 10 selected women to lead all national work linked to the W4GF Accountability Toolkit (more details on the lead are below). An overarching goal of the project is to advance community-led monitoring women so that women are empowered to provide effective oversight of programmes that are supported by the Global Fund in a transparent and systematic manner, and with the key goal of ensuring quality of care and access. The following criteria was used to select participants:

  • Ability to demonstrate ties to the national country coordinating mechanism (CCM) and national networks addressing HIV, TB or malaria in the selected countries and consider such monitoring activities as an extension of their work;
  • Ability and interest in representing women in all their diversity;
  • Affiliation with one or more networks or organisations of young women, women living with HIV, women’s/human rights groups, and networks of TB and malaria who are willing to support this work; and
  • Affiliation with one or more networks or organisations of women from key populations – including but not limited to women with disabilities, women who use drugs, women who engage in sex work, and lesbian, bisexual and transgender women.
  • Bilingual abilities will be essential – English will be required.

The lead organisation

The lead organisation or network leads and supports all national work linked to the implementation of the W4GF Accountability Toolkit. As part of this work, it will also take steps to support women to influence Global Fund grants and programming – including by highlighting what is and is not working well from the perspective of women living with or affected by HIV, TB or malaria. The lead organisation will also support women advocates to identify what requires refocusing in Global Fund programmes and services and then ensuring that this information is made available and publicized in ways that might best influence positive change.The following diversities and criteria will be essential for the three lead organisations selected:

  • Directly represent and support women and prioritize gender equality;
  • Demonstrated ties to the CCM and national networks addressing HIV, TB or malaria;
  • Strong commitment to human rights and a focus on HIV, TB and malaria;
  • Strong affiliations with networks or organisations of women/people living with HIV and/or organisations or networks focusing on TB and malaria that are willing to support this work;
  • Strong commitment to and support of women from key populations, including (but not limited to) women with disabilities, women who use drugs, women who engage in sex work, and gay, lesbian and transgender people; and
  • Ability to administer funds and staff who can dedicate time to this work and see this as an extension of their work at the national level;
  • Existing for at least 3 years.

UPDATE

Women4GlobalFund (W4GF) – with the support of the ViiV Healthcare, and Frontline AIDS – organised a virtual workshop (19 – 28 April 2021) for 30 women from Cameroon, India and Tanzania Enabling Women to Track Global Fund Investments Towards Gender Equality Across HIV, Tuberculosis & Malaria. A full meeting report will be available at the end of May to highlight the depth and breadth of our discussions.

This outcomes statement is a summation of what participants would like to see as they move forward with community led monitoring (CLM). Whilst the three countries are diverse and face a myriad of different challenges, the overall priorities for CLM unite the group to promote and protect human rights and gender equality in Global Fund–supported programmes. Please find the workshop report available here.

For more information contact Sophie Dilmitis, W4GF Global Coordinator at sophie@women4gf.org. To find out more about how this is moving forward nationally please contact the three lead organisations here: Cameroon Nancy Bolima (nancyakwi@yahoo.com); India, Daxa Patel (daxancpi@ncpiplus.org) and Tanzania Joan Chamungu (joanchamungu@yahoo.com)