Active Citizens
Checking in: visiting the experience
Sometimes, our blog posts are so high level that we forget to give the interesting minutiae and details of our experience when we go every week. We are currently working in Lanet Umoja location working with women groups to collect SDG 5 data in partnership with Civicus Datashift and with the leadership of Chief Kariuki…
Read articleData for data’s sake… is good.
Today was a public holiday in Kenya as muslims celebrate Idd-ul-Adha, the festival that commemorates Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his son to please Almighty God. While the rest of the country took time off, my team and I used the day to bond with each other in the office over chocolate encrusted doughnuts, Mandazi (a…
Read articleThe long road to citizen power
Very frequently, and more so lately, our team gets up very early in the morning and prepares to set off to Lanet Umoja location in Nakuru County. We usually leave at about lunch time, having made many small and important logistical preparations. On most days, we are ferrying boxes filled with paper forms – data…
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Making Transparency Matter: What Citizens Care About
At the Open Institute, we have centered much of our work around transparency – making government and corporate data available to everyone. The argument is simple: the more data and information there is available, the more citizens are empowered to participate in their governance. When citizens participate, the argument follows, life is improved because they…
Read articleThe Devolution Twitter Chat Storify by The Open Institute and The World Bank
We are grateful to everyone who participated in the #Devolution Twitter chat at the World Bank Open Day at Nairobi Club. Here is a flavour of the discussions. [View the story “#WBGOpenDay #Devolution Storify” on Storify]
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Global Goals for Local Impact: Chiefs’ Update
Yesterday we met the administration leadership of the whole division, where Lanet Umoja is. As you may recall from a previous blog post, a division has several locations. The Dundori division has four locations – Dundori, Lanet-Umoja, Githioro and Mirironi. In the meeting, which was chaired by the Assistant County Commissioner in charge of Dundori…
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Developing the right tools for citizen participation
It’s always an exciting moment when an idea is formulated and the time to engage other users nears. The introduction of such a system needs to be well thought of especially if there are technical aspect involved. We (Open Institute) recently embarked on a citizen involved and engagement pilot project in one of the locations in…
Read articleTHE KENYA BUDGET CALENDAR
The International Budget Partnership (IBP) Kenya shared with the public the updated version of Kenya’s budget calendar. This budget map outlines key dates in Kenya’s National and County budget cycles from formulation to audit/oversight stages. In addition, it shows various budget documents that should be made available throughout the cycle. You can find the calendar…
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BUNTWANI ROUNDTABLE: DEVOLUTION & THE DATA REVOLUTION IN KENYA
A Roundtable Conversation, suppported by UNICEF Kenya, on the State of Devolution and the Data Revolution in Kenya was held in Nairobi. This event was aimed at drawing on both experience and evidence-based lessons to share, support and capture in the current devolution and data revolution landscape. In addition, we hope to review the progress that Kenya has made…
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