HUYE - The National Decentralisation Project last week revealed plans to support District Joint Action Forums (JAF’s), become fully operational in all the districts.
An official of the National Decentralisation Implementation Secretariat (NDIS), Apollinaire Mushinzimana, said they hope the new measure will help bolster development in districts.

"The project will provide the basic requirements to have a well functioning JAF and this will include supporting the establishment of a permanent secretariat in each district,” said Mushinzimana.

"The project will support the functioning and organisation of JAF meetings on a quarterly basis, training the partners to have a joint understanding of what the platform is and how it can be used to boost local economic development and improve social service delivery to citizens.”

He was speaking at a two-day retreat of district JAF committees and the Provincial Partners Forum on Friday.
The NDIS project is sponsored by the Dutch Government and operates under the Ministry of Local government.

Its main role is to ensure the decentralisation policy in Rwanda is being implemented in a smooth way. It is charged with the implementation, support to local government, monitoring and evaluation.

"Implementing decentralisation means supporting all the mechanisms or forums that are helping the Ministry of Local Government to deliver. You cannot implement if you are not partnering with all the stakeholders active in the district,” said Mushinzimana.

Jeannette Caroline Ndiwamariya, the vice president of the Provincial Partners Forum (FPP) and governance manager of Care International in the Province, stressed that JAF is important because it is an open platform where all stake holders meet to discuss matters of development.

"This forum enables partners to work together, plan together, implement together and monitor how socio-economic development is progressing in the district,” she said.

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