The following are recommendations that were brought forward by 140 various stakeholders comprising of directors, junior counsellors, junior parliamentarians, government ministries, independent commissions, labor, development partners, private sector and the church who attended the 10th NGO Directors Summer School in Bulawayo.
NANGO, as the coordinating body of NGOs, has the role of prioritising and streamlining the recommendations. The first step has been to categorise the recommendations in four clusters which are social, economic, political and legal. Each is led by a sector specialist.
- Strengthen the fight against corruption for both private and public sectors
- Lobby for a practical and consistent monetary policy
- Advocate for affordability of assistive material for children with disabilities
- Capacity strengthening of children and youth – with direct resources to support their interventions poised for community change
- Communities should have more development initiatives that are undertaken to complement government efforts to bring about meaningful change
- NANGO to coordinate EU multi-stakeholder meetings on corruption
- NANGO to consult and claim its space in the national, regional forums
- CSOs should push for tests and treatment for cervical and breast cancer by donors and government
- National dialogues to build a national identity and ideology
- Self-regulation should be made functional among civil society
- Provide mentorship and skills transfer to young people in civil society and corporate sector through promoting exit strategies for leaders
- Develop a shared people’s vision for 2030
- Mainstream gender equality in CSO work systematically
- Lobbying for affordability of assistive material for children with disabilities
- National dialogues to build a national identity and ideology
- Capacity strengthening of children and youth – with direct resources to support their interventions poised for community change
- Promote evidence-based advocacy
- NANGO to give feedback on steps taken towards engaging the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development towards scrapping the 2% tax
- All national and local government budgets must meet government bench marks
- Focus on domestic resource mobilization
- Ensure affordability of drugs
- There is need for government to align laws with constitution to bring about or implement devolution. This will enable communities to have autonomy and prioritise development in their areas
- NANGO to engage the state on all accountability issues as per Zimbabwean Constitution
- Ensure children’s boards participate with government’s policy making and budgeting processes
- Need for feedback on implementation key reforms like security and political reforms by the government
- Ease of doing business for locals
- Urge government to finalise and publicise the land audit
- Government should mobilise domestic resources to increase investment in primary health care specifically infrastructure development, water and sanitation)
- Need to lobby the government to start implementing devolution as per the provision in the constitution
- Gukurahundi should be addressed
- NANGO to capacitate NGOs on fundraising
- Improvement of health status through equitable provision of ambulances in all districts
- NANGO should draft a strategy of engagement of duty bearers
- The mines and mineral bill must not be amended but we need a new mines and mineral bill that speaks to the interests of the majority of Zimbabweans through public consultations
- Self-regulation of NGOs
- Enforcement of by-laws
- Strengthen institutions towards holding duty bearers to account
- Empowerment of commissions to effectively execute their mandates
- Commitment to build a new culture of political governance that is complementary
- Building confidence of society in state institutions
- Strong parliamentary and state institutions
- Zimbabwe’s openness to business needs to be complemented by a positive internal political/ economic timetable.
- State must prioritise local savings and an environment that builds domestic investment
- Churches and CSO’s to be given space to work alongside National Peace and Recommendations Commission
- Resourcing the health sector in compliance with the Abuja Declaration
- Unpack the open for business mantra and influence donors to come and implement directly
- It is resolved that NANGO develops and deploys/ implements a robust and aggressive communication and advocacy strategy in order to respond to emergent national issues and enable citizens to better understand CSOs’ role as a watchdog
- Deliberate mapping and characterisation of stakeholders
- Develop and consolidate effective global alliances
- Leverage local partnerships
- Continuous governance and budget conversations at all levels of society
- Tackle polarisation of society and political divisions
- Champion the cause to facilitate a process for Zimbabwe political formations to find each other, enforce effective parliament oversight and cut off government expenditure.
- Scale up citizen participation
- Locate NGO programs in the context of global thinking ie. guided by SDGs
- Monitoring and Evaluation to pick issues and unleash appropriate responses
- Capacity building of young people to include integrity and anti-corruption
- Inclusion of climate change and disability in programming
