Kenya is one of the 65 participating countries of the Open Government Partnership (OGP), a multilateral initiative that seeks to make governments more open, accountable and responsive to citizens. Overseen by representatives from governments and civil society organisations, the multi-stakeholder effort aims to secure concrete commitments from governments to promote transparency, empower citizens, fight corruption and harness new technologies to strengthen governance.

OGP formally launched in September 2011 with 8 founding governments (Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, Norway, Philippines, South Africa, United Kingdom, United States) endorsing the Open Government Declaration, committing to “foster a global culture of open government that empowers and delivers for citizens, and advances the ideals of open and participatory 21st century government”. OGP has since welcomed the commitment of 57 additional governments to join the initiative.

To be a member of OGP, countries are required to endorse the Open Government Declaration, commit to independent reporting on their progress, and deliver a country action plan that has to be developed with public consultation.

In collaboration with the Open Government Working Group, the Kenya ICT Authority released Kenya’s draft action plan for November 2014 to November 2016. Following public consultation this will be Kenya’s second action plan, having published its first in 2011 (available from the OGP website).

Examples of the commitments they have outlined in the draft document include:

• Supporting the establishment of Huduma Centers, developing a complaints portal;
• Adopting open-source platforms (such as www.bungeni.org) to enhance parliamentary and county assembly information sharing with the public;
• Open budgets;
• Developing policies and a framework for data protection and Access to information;
• Increasing awareness of the Kenya Open Data Initiative (KODI) and its open data portal where they aim to publish datasets to regularly;
• Developing a central depository for public contracts; and
• Supporting gender equality and women’s full participation in civic life, the public administration and political processes.

To give your feedback on the action plan, you can email opengovpartnership@ict.go.ke directly with your input, follow @ICTAuthorityKE on Twitter and let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.

View the Draft OGP Action Plan by the Kenya ICT Authority on Scribd