STAR-Ghana Foundation and the West Africa Civil Society Institute (WACSI) have held an orientation for catalyst fund partners under the Civil Society Strengthening Programme Shifting Power (CSSP-#StP) in Kumasi in the Ashanti Region.
The CSSP-#StP is an eight-year programme being implemented by STAR Ghana Foundation and WACSI with funding from https://www.comicrelief.com/ and the UK Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), that seeks to enhance the effectiveness, responsiveness, and resilience of Civil Society Actors (CSAs).
Some participants in the orientation
The CSSP-StP is phased into three components namely the Catalyst Fund, Civil Society Strengthening Fund, and the Matching Fund. Catalyst Fund, which is the first phase, will run up to one year. The fund will identify and reach out to smaller organisations, both formal and informal, working at the district and community level and recognised within their districts and communities with demand driven capacity support.
The orientation, therefore, sought to create a platform for partners to better understand the CSSP-#StP, the capacity strengthening intervention to be delivered under the programme, and expectations of the partnership.
Additionally, it provided a platform for explaining the operations of STAR-Ghana Foundation and WACSI to the partners.
In all, 40 participants participated in the two-day orientation programme from 15th-16th June 2023, and were drawn from twenty (20) organisations that have been approved within the domain of the catalyst fund as partners by the Grants Committee of STAR-Ghana Foundation, following a mapping exercise and targeted invitation call.
Sarah Adjei, Project Manager, STAR-Ghana Foundation
At the opening of the orientation, the Project Manager of the CSSP-#StP, Sarah Adjei, noted although civil society has played some significant roles in the community through their actions and advocacy in contributing to quality education, improved healthcare, potable water and sanitation, and agriculture, among others, they faced challenges with sustainability due to lack of resources.
She said funding sources for civil society have been mainly foreign and external.
“How sustainable is our work? How are we going to get some form of support from the foreign and external finances that are available? she quizzed.
She said that currently, the system is changing, donor funds are dwindling, and civil society cannot survive on benevolence. This brings in competition and to be able to compete, it is important to have the right systems in place to compete for the funds available to support civil society work.
Thus, she said, the CSSP-#StP programme is coming in to support civil society strengthening and sustainability.
“How do we ensure that as community-based organisations, alliances and as networks our capacities are built and strengthened to the point where we can also access external and foreign funding, and even within our spaces ensure that we have the right capacity to be able to access funding sources?
“With this programme, we are running on the premise that if we strengthen the capacities of civil society actors to effectively work with their constituents and they are able to work with them to prioritise around what is important to them, and they are able to connect their capacities, knowledge and resources, and are able to advocate in the areas where they work, then we are sure that we will strengthen the agency of the people that we work with,” she said.
The Head of Programmes at STAR-Ghana Foundation, Eunice Racheal Agbenyadzi, corroborated the categories of civil society have different experiences with sustainability, and the funding dynamics show those at community and district levels are unable to access funds and so, are unable to fulfill their mandate.
“So, in a sense, the CSSP-#StP can be seen as an affirmative action in civil society- supporting organisations that work close to the communities, supporting organisations that are emerging,” she said.
Eunice Racheal Agbenyadzi, Head of Programmes, STAR-Ghana Foundation
She added that the catalyst fund is seeking to provide a level playing field for all organisations.
The Executive Director of WACSI, Nana Yaa Afadzinu, said that shifting power within the development space requires support, and so, the CSSP-#StP presents a real opportunity to civil society to show that they can work together as partners at the community level, national level, regional and global levels to bring about the huge transformation and change that is expected.
