The role of citizens’ participation in planning and budgeting process in Rwanda; a case study of Kicukiro district

Abstract

The government of Rwanda has invested much effort in promoting citizens’ participation in planning and budgeting process and to that end, the government put in place various to ensure a participatory planning and budget process. There is a quite good number of literature in the field of citizens’ participation. Most studied and surveys in Rwanda have focused on accessing the level of citizens’ awareness and participation. However, no particular study done to ascertain the importance and relevance of promoting citizens’ participation in planning and budgeting process in Rwandan context and social–economic environment. In this study on citizens’ participation in planning and budgeting process, we have used Kicukiro district as a case study given its outstanding performance in local government performance contracts evaluation for three successive years. We evaluated the efficiency of existing channels for citizens’ participation and analyzed the relevance of promoting citizens’ participation from a citizen’s perspective. We administered a questionnaire to the population in Kicukiro district that focused on collecting citizens’ views on whether their participation would have an impact on district revenue performance on one hand and on local government performance contracts on the other hand. The results from the study have concurred that effective citizens’ participation in planning is relevant to the country. Its relevance was established by the potential increase in revenue collection and efficiency and its impact on performance contracts preparation, implementation as well as monitoring and evaluation. The study also revealed a disconnection between different administrative levels in their communication that is a hindrance for effective citizens’ participation. In this research, we have made a review of different literatures, based on the theories therein, we made an analysis of the collected data, presented them in various forms and from the findings of the study, we formulated our recommendations and draw conclusions