Govt unveils new guidelines for PDM project

The Parish Development Model (PDM) secretariat has said the implementation of guidelines of the programme, which were released yesterday, are meant to improve social services in the community.

While releasing the guidelines, Dr Sande Nixon, an economist in the PDM secretariat, said PDM is built on seven pillars but pillar IV provides guidelines which ministries, departments, government agencies and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) should follow to improve social services to the community.

“This one looks at what can be done to improve social services like health, education, agriculture and the environment in the community. This is what state and none state actors will be using to deliver social services. All NGOs will partner with government to transform the community,” he said.

He added that under PDM, the parish is the epicentre for community development and they have been working with NGOs including Living Goods, United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (Unicef), GIZ and Brac to teach communities how activities under Pillar IV should be implemented.

Mr Micheal Miiro, a social inclusion specialist with the International Develop Consultants, who developed the guidelines, said they are working on popularising the other pillars  so that the community is aware of how they are supposed to contribute towards their community development.

Mr Miiro said right now, the public thinks that the PDM is only about receiving finances from the government and yet there are other aspects such as water, sanitation and hygiene, environmental conservation, and ownership of infrastructure, which they are meant to contribute to.

“How is the community involved in ensuring the smooth running of the school even if it is the government who built it. Even if the government is implementing PDM, what is your contribution? If it is an NGO working in a parish, how are its activities aligned towards the implementation of PDM?” he said.

Ms Agnes Batangira, project coordinator of GIZ, said with funding from UKaid, GIZ has been providing technical support to the PDM secretariat to ensure that people understand the PDM project.

Ms Amy Kakiza Rwakihebo, the director of partnerships at Living Goods, said they have been supporting the government to improve health services at the community level.

She said they want PDM resources leveraged to deliver smooth services in the community.

“We supported ministries of Local government, Health, Education, Water and Environment to go down to the parish and consult with the community how to improve service delivery our area of concern was community health,” she said.

She added that they want to understand whether the way the programme is being implemented speaks to the community’s needs.