To Interested Applicants:

DAI’s LUC project, on behalf of the United States Department of State, Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor (DRL), is soliciting applications for awarding grants to successful applications submitted in response to this APS.

• The APS solicits applications for activities/interventions that will be implemented in target areas in Lahore and Faisalabad in Punjab, and Khairpur in Sindh and applicants should clearly mention the geographic areas in which project activities will be implemented.
• The length of the proposed grants may be up to a maximum of one year. The total amount of funding currently available for this APS is for a period of up to one year.
• DAI may choose to fully fund or incrementally fund the selected application(s). The number of grant awards and amount of available funding is subject to change and DAI reserves the right to make no grant awards as a result of this APS.
• All applications for review in the first round of evaluations are due by April 30, 2022.   All applications review in the 2nd round of evaluations is due by July 31, 2022. At the discretion of DAI, applications received after the first round of evaluations may be considered on a rolling basis.
• Information Sessions will be held on the APS through open public invitation to all potential applicants before close of the two rounds.
• Questions on this APS should be addressed to [email protected] and will be reviewed and answered on a rolling basis. Telephone calls regarding technical content will not be entertained.

FUNDING OPPORTUNITY DESCRIPTION

(1)   DESCRIPTION OF LUC PROJECT

The US Department of State Bureau of Democracy, Rights and Labor (DRL) Strengthening Leadership within Union Councils (LUC) to improve Citizen Responsiveness project is a four-year program aimed at working with local governments in Pakistan to increase the capacity of Union Councils (UCs) within the Sindh and Punjab provinces to fulfill their commitments to providing services to local communities and improve the equitable allocation of local resources at the grassroots level.

LUC will work with the Union Councils, Neighborhood and Village Councils, independent commissions and government agencies. The project will also support local civil society organizations (CSOs) to achieve the following objectives:

Objective 1: Increase the local councils’ capacity to engage in good governance best practices

Objective 2: Increase the leadership skills of local council members

Objective 3: Provide councils with opportunities to engage under-represented populations (particularly women, youth and minorities)

While objective 3 is focused on women, youth and minorities, the participation of individuals and groups from the underrepresented population is also important and necessary to the achievement of results in Objectives 1 and 2, as well as achieving the overall objective of LUC.

TECHNICAL SCOPE OF WORK - SUMMARY

Context: Effective local governments are needed to address grievances of all the communities living in Sindh and Punjab. Both provinces amended the LG laws and proposed to hold LG elections in the first quarter of year 2022, after the completion of delimitation process of Local Councils by Election Commission of Pakistan in March/April, 2022. 

The scope of powers of the UC/NC/VCs varies and they have faced problems including discriminatory spending of public funds in LG system, issues of awareness and non-compliance with rules and regulations, transparency in sharing of information and operations, under-utilization of funds, underrepresentation of women, youth and minorities who are not directly elected and their engagement in day-to-day affairs, reserved seat members lacking capacity to lead and effectively represent their constituencies. Apart from this, LGs have limited authority to collect taxes and generate additional source of revenues.

Through the grants under this APS, LUC intends to strengthen the capacities of local council members (officials and elected and reserved seat representatives of underrepresented populations) in good governance practices, as well as to create opportunities for increased citizens engagement with their local council officials and representatives.

Approach: LUC will work with relevant local government officials, and active elected and reserved seat UC/NC/VC representative to build their capacity in local governance to better provide services equitably to their local communities. Specifically, LUC will focus on enhancing knowledge base and skillsets of both local government officials and elected representatives in local government affairs regarding administrative rules, regulations, procedures; planning and budgeting processes; and service delivery, and increased citizen engagement in local governance and planning and budgeting processes.

LUC will also constitute Advocacy Networks/Support Groups at local, tehsil and district levels to highlight and resolve the issues and concerns pertaining to local government service delivery and functions of under-represented communities, and include range of stakeholders from both right holders (communities and citizens) and duty bearers (officials and elected representatives).

Furthermore, a cohort of human rights defenders, such as press clubs/journalists, lawyers/district bar council, members and CSOs representatives will also be identified for capacity building on LUC thematic areas who will in turn serve as a resource to help bridge the communication and relationship gaps between right holders and duty bearers, and also serve as sponsors and participants in implementation of project interventions.

The following are LUC’s target areas (districts and local councils) in Punjab and Sindh for implementation of project activities:

For further details, please see attached APS document.

LUC project is organizing a webinar on “Information/Briefing Session” about Annual Program Statement

For Punjab on Wednesday – April 06, 2022 at 11:00am

And For Sindh on Thursday – April 07, 2022 at 11:00am

The purpose of this session is to explain the process of APS and LUC scope of work. 

Interested organizations who are willing to join the session can share their expression of interest by submitting their details along with email IDs to [email protected]