April eNews
Bhutan Centre for Media and Democracy (BCMD) in Partnerships
As BCMD geared up for rolling out implementation of its EU-funded Project, ‘Building Inclusive Democracy: Civil Society, Parliamentarians, Media, and Youth Strengthen Good Governance in Bhutan,’ it reached out to other grantees, also implementing similar projects in the country. BCMD has held discussions with Helvetas, International IDEA and Save the Children in identifying commonalities between the different projects and accordingly harmonising efforts to bring about efficiencies and effectiveness in the project interventions.
The joint-partnership project between BCMD and Deutsche Welle Academie (DWA) will focus on CSO,Parliamentarians, Media and Youth over the three-years implementation period. While the project implementation period began in February 2024, following project inception works in the month of March, the BCMD project team went about with the pre-planning works and discussions in preparation of the work plan for the year ahead.
Consultation meeting with officials from Helvetas Bhutan Country Office and IDEA International
CSOs on discussions for effective and inclusive Service Delivery
BCMD convened a consultation meeting involving six CSOs on the 8th of April 2024. Respect, Educate, Nurture and Empower Women (RENEW), Phensem Parents Support Group (PPSG), Royal Society for Senior Citizens (RSSC), Disabled People’s Organisation of Bhutan (DPO), Draktsho, and Ability Bhutan Society (ABS) participated in the consultation.
The purpose of the meeting was to strategise for an upcoming event on Inclusive Service Delivery scheduled in the month of May. The primary objective was to tailor the event effectively to express the diverse needs of the service recipients, namely the vulnerable groups and enable the service providers in particularly enhancing their services to cater to the needs of the vulnerable groups, such as Persons with Disabilities, women and children in difficult circumstances, youth in conflict with the law, and senior citizens.
The first CSO Quarterly Meeting
Over the course of two days from 25-26 April 2024, the first CSO quarterly meeting brought together representatives from 44 Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) based across the country. The meeting convened to deliberate on key matters pertaining to CSOs, and included discussions on the Endowment Fund requirement, CSO-Government collaboration guideline, strengthening inter-CSO collaboration, and CSOs & Digital engagement, among other agendas.
The two Eminent Members, Mr. Passang Tshering (Bhutan Toilet Organisation) and Mr. Tashi Namgay (Bhutan Kidney Foundation) facilitated the proceedings as the CSOs worked around several policy recommendations to promote a more inclusive, participatory, empowered and independent civil society. The meeting also highlighted the opportunity of strengthening CSO collaboration with the Government by supporting the latter in terms of service delivery to the community(ies).
BCMD provided secretarial services to the two Eminent members in terms of logistics arrangement and rapporteuring during the event proceedings.
This meeting was organised by the Civil Society Organizations Authority (CSOA) in collaboration with BCMD and DW Akademie Asia, Helvetas Bhutan, and International IDEA, facilitated through funding provided by the European Union (EU).