Liberia: Spotlight Initiative 2.0 PMER Working Group Launched

• A multi-stakeholder Participatory Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting (PMER) Working Group has been established for the EU-funded Liberia Spotlight Initiative 2.0.
• The group was launched during a three-day meeting in Monrovia, attended by government, UN agencies, civil society, and EU representatives.
• Its purpose is to strengthen accountability, learning, and evidence-based decision-making to improve the lives of women and girls in Liberia.
• The Programme Monitoring, Evaluation, Learning and Knowledge Management (PMEL-KM) Plan, operationalizing 45 indicators, will standardize monitoring and reporting.
• The framework emphasizes community participation, recognizing women and girls as rights holders and utilizing methods like community scorecards and shadow reporting.

This initiative marks a pivotal moment for the program, which is jointly implemented by UNDP, UNFPA, and UN Women under the guidance of the UN Resident Coordinator.

A significant stride has been made towards bolstering accountability and evidence-based decision-making within the EU-funded Liberia Spotlight Initiative 2.0 with the recent establishment of a multi-stakeholder Participatory Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting (PMER) Working Group. This new body was formally inaugurated during a three-day meeting, convened by the Programme Management and Coordination Unit (PMCU), which took place from September 29 to October 1 at One UN House in Monrovia. The gathering brought together a diverse array of participants, including representatives from various government institutions, the European Union Delegation to Liberia, UNDP, UNFPA, UN Women, civil society organizations, and the Civil Society National Reference Group (CS-NRG), alongside other key stakeholders.

This initiative marks a pivotal moment for the program, which is jointly implemented by UNDP, UNFPA, and UN Women under the guidance of the UN Resident Coordinator. Funded by the European Union through the Spotlight Initiative 2.0 Fund, the program's overarching goal is to advance gender equality and eliminate violence against women and girls, as well as other harmful practices in Liberia. The formation of the Liberia Spotlight Initiative 2.0 PMER Working Group underscores a commitment to ensuring that program results are not merely tracked, but also thoroughly validated, understood, and effectively utilized to improve the lives of women and girls across the nation.

The newly formed Liberia Spotlight Initiative 2.0 PMER Working Group is designed to function as the program's central technical platform, dedicated to strengthening coordination, accountability, learning, and the measurement of results. Participants in the inaugural meeting stressed that achieving meaningful and lasting change necessitates credible evidence demonstrating a tangible difference in the lives of women and girls, particularly those residing in rural, marginalized, and underserved communities, rather than simply reporting activities and outputs.

Central to this endeavor is the Programme Monitoring, Evaluation, Learning and Knowledge Management (PMEL-KM) Plan Liberia, a comprehensive framework that integrates monitoring, evaluation, research, learning, reporting, accountability, and knowledge management. This robust Liberia gender equality monitoring framework operationalizes 45 specific program indicators, providing a unified system for tracking progress, assessing outcomes, and informing future program decisions. Through the adoption of harmonized indicators, common methodologies, shared data sources, and standardized reporting practices, partners involved in the EU-funded Liberia Spotlight Initiative accountability efforts will be better equipped to consistently measure progress and evaluate impact across all program activities.

A distinguishing characteristic of the PMER framework is its profound commitment to participation and inclusion. This approach moves beyond viewing women and girls solely as beneficiaries, instead recognizing them as rights holders, influential leaders, and agents of change whose direct experiences are indispensable for truly understanding program effectiveness. Civil society organizations, community groups, and the Civil Society National Reference Group are slated to play a crucial role in generating, interpreting, and validating evidence throughout the program's implementation.

To strengthen accountability, several participatory approaches will be employed. These include community scorecards, participatory monitoring visits, reflection and validation sessions, Most Significant Change methodologies, shadow reporting, and various other social accountability tools. These methods for Participatory Monitoring Evaluation Reporting Liberia are expected to complement traditional routine monitoring by capturing nuanced changes in attitudes, social norms, relationships, access to services, and lived experiences that quantitative indicators alone might not fully reflect.

Beyond its participatory elements, the Liberia Spotlight Initiative 2.0 PMER Working Group will also be instrumental in enhancing the quality, consistency, and overall credibility of program data. Partners have underscored the critical importance of upholding rigorous standards for data accuracy, completeness, timeliness, reliability, validity, and traceability. To ensure that all reported results are substantiated by credible evidence, the initiative will implement routine data verification, spot checks, source-document reviews, and comprehensive quality assurance processes.

This concerted effort to strengthen accountability and data integrity is vital for the EU-funded Spotlight Initiative 2.0, which aims to advance gender equality and eliminate violence against women Liberia EU. By leveraging existing platforms and national systems, the program seeks to ensure that its interventions lead to meaningful and lasting improvements in the lives of women and girls, making this development a critical milestone in the ongoing fight against gender-based violence and inequality.

This initiative establishes new, standardized monitoring and reporting requirements for organizations partnering with the EU-funded Spotlight Initiative 2.0 in Liberia. Lawyers and compliance officers advising NGOs, government agencies, or international bodies involved in gender equality and VAWG programs in Liberia should review the PMEL-KM Plan to ensure compliance with these enhanced accountability frameworks and reporting methodologies.

Source: Original reporting via AllAfrica