Women’s Participation in and Contribution to Governance in Madagascar

Executive summery

Background

The Royal Norwegian Embassy, Madagascar has provided the EISA, The Electoral Institute of South Africa, with a grant of 6 mill NOK for the period 1.7.2008 – 31.12.2010 to provide capacity-building support to women in Madagascar to ”Increase the participation of women in public problem-solving, decision-making and management institutions by 30% in 2012”

The specific outputs of the project are:

• The gender parity in electoral processes is improved;
• The capacity of women at grassroots level is built and/or consolidated;
• The capacity of the Promotion of Gender Office is built and strengthened;
• Women in leadership positions at local level are imparted with managerial, leadership and policymaking skills;
• A well resourced documentation centre provides up to date global and continental information on gender issues.

The Embassy commissioned a Mid Term Review to provide advice to the Embassy regarding the follow up of the project. The Mid Term Review consisted of Ms. Bodil Maal from the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation, Norad, Liss Schanke from the Norwegian Association of Local and Regional Authorities, KS, and was assisted by Mr Ralaivelo Maminirinarivo, independent consultant from Madagascar. The MTR was given a total of 20 days for the assignment, including desk study of project documentation, field visit to Madagascar during the period 25.11-4.12.2009 and elaboration of MTR report of maximum 35 pages. The MTR team focus our review on the link between political participation and pro poor change, in line with the overall Norwegian development goal of poverty alleviation and the Norad guidelines for support to civil society.