ABOUT SIASA PLACE
Siasa Place is a youth-led non-governmental organization (NGO), established in 2015 that specializes in working with youth and building institutional structures that support youth. Since its inception, the organization has been working with young people aged between 18 and 34 years. SP has focused on youth expertise in policy review and youth participation in decision making processes including the budget process. SP has trained youths on policy making and networking with other youth organizations at both the national and county level, to improve policy and on the budget process to increase accountability.
PROJECT BACKGROUND
Per the 2019 census, the Kenyan population aged below 35 years was 75.1 %. Those age 0-14 were 39% of the total population. Yet, youth are largely excluded and underrepresented in governance and decision-making structures. Most do not understand the importance of their participation while the government has failed to facilitate civic education or engage them in the development agenda. At the same time, poor service delivery, the mismatch between government priority and people’s needs, regional, political and ethnic animosity and run-away corruption dominating the governance system have resulted in governance failures that led to the birth of BBI. After extensive engagement with stakeholders, the BBI taskforce drafted a report that recommended administrative, policy and constitutional reforms in the country.
While some youths engage in political discourses, a significant proportion of them are undecided about the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) and the possible referendum. Other youths make their decisions based on regional or party inclinations, without necessarily reading the report or understanding the consequences of different proposals. During BBI events in 2020, youth were used to mobilize people to attend meetings. They booed people and even in some instances physically assaulted people who were opposing the BBI document. If youth were more organized and strategic, they would have used their numbers to mobilize their issues instead of concentrating on protecting the interest of political leaders.
Youth and women are the most affected with joblessness and lack of services. Being a majority and yet the least represented, more avenues should be created to take their priorities into consideration, particularly, youth women and people with disabilities. As a result, key development processes like the County Integrated Development plans (CIDP) and Annual Development plans (ADP) do not reflect the youth voices. The just concluded BBI process was not an exception. These plans impact the very communities that they live in. They determine the budgets that county governments will utilize in certain periods, and what issues are termed as priorities. We believe that if the capacity of youth is built, dialogue forums organized and information dissemination platforms created, then youth will understand the importance of their participation and have the knowledge to either support or reject the BBI document based on facts because they will be able to determine whether the document will serve their interests or not.
Since inception in 2015, Siasa Place has extensively been involved in capacity building and creating platforms for the youth to engage in governance processes. In the recent past, through the Sauti Yetu (Our Voice) project, the organization collaborated with county-based youth serving organizations to create a platform for youth to participate in the BBI process. The project organized county-level forums through which youth were able to compile views from youth serving organizations which were then presented to the BBI taskforce in an organized manner. SP partnered with a total of 87 organizations in 6 counties: youth serving organizations, movements, networks, political parties and universities among others.
SP identified four key recommendations. One, given that youth are the majority of the population which is not reflected in the national leadership, SP recommended the creation of an independent youth ministry, national youth commission, or national youth council. Two, SP recommended that the government prioritize economic empowerment of the youth. Three, given the scale of corruption and its impact, corruption cases should be handled in short periods of time (for example, one year. Four, one of the two proposed deputy prime minister positions should be reserved for a youth. SP’s submission was 1 of 7 submissions that came from a total of 21 youth organizations across the country. The final report adopted one of the four recommendations: the establishment of a youth commission. Yet, the effective fruition of the council is still a challenge and many other issues have not yet been addressed.
To realize the above recommendations, the project scheduled various strategies. One of which is to conduct a Youth advocacy plan for a more democratic political processes workshop.
The two-day workshops will be attended by sixty (60) youth leaders representing the eight regions. The workshop will target thirty (30) youth representing county based serving organizations, twenty (20) youth representing political wing of political parties and ten (10) youth representing National youth council and ministry responsible for youth affairs.
SCOPE AND MAIN TASKS DURING THE WORKSHOPS
The Consultant will be responsible to:
CONSULTANT DELIVERABLES
The following will be the expected deliverables of the consultancy:
CONSULTANT COMPETENCE AND SKILLS
Interested consultant(s) should demonstrate the following qualifications:
DEADLINE AND SUBMISSION OF EXPRESSION OF INTEREST
Siasa Place invites interested consultant(s) to submit the following by 5th February 2021 to support@siasaplace.com.
EVALUTATION AND SELECTION PROCESS
The selection process of the consultant will be based on the set of criteria developed by Siasa Place evaluation committee.