1 Consultative Meeting on “Promoting more effective partnership between INGOs and other CSOs” building on Oxfam’s “Future Roles of INGO in Cambodia”, 24 Feb 2015 “Building partnership and joint advocacy in Cambodia” Mr. Sinthay Neb, Director, the Advocacy and Policy Institute (API)

Monday 30 March Why we think the issues discussed today are important Why? Because a strong civil society is the best guarantee for influencing policy change and sustainable development. Why? Because only when civil society is strong citizens can influence the conditions that make for their well-being Many donors have been interested in supporting NGOs working together When we get together and act collectively to pursue our interests Only by acting together NGOs become strong. NGOs can be acted together if they really share the objective, agree upon a common strategy, trust the way they have organized themselves.

How partnership has come about? There are varieties of ways that the partnership has come together. commonly begin with their own interest on the same issue. Motivation to come together encouraged from their analysis. Have had prior experiences of working together to certain extent on same issues and activities of common concerns. Have interest and need in working together more. Require a multi-sectoral approach across various levels. Because each sectors and level requires specific skills and expertise – it is only by combining these skills that can make big impact/results. The personal close relationship between leaders of organizations is the major mechanism for working together.

For examples: There are groups who come together and committed to work together on specific issues and policies. 1.NGO law 2.Access to Information law 3.Cybercrime law 4.New road traffic law 5.Etc.

These seem to share a common set of characteristics/principles –Joint objectives –Joint perspectives –Joint strategies –Joint responsibilities –Shared interests –Joint achievements 5

What would be the constraint and Challenges? We have faced similar constraints and challenges. Leadership: It is often seen in partnership/cooperation groups whose leaders’ quality is lack on facilitation, delegation of tasks and responsibilities, and help moving things forward. weakening strategic focus: advocacy strategy. Competing between small (or lack of resources) and big (more resources) NGOs as well as between NGOs and IOs. Time and resource availability: There are always constraints in term of time management, availability and resource availability. Sometime, member of NGOs could not keep up with the commitment.

What we can do next…. There have been many recommendations from all sections of society, and particularly from CSOs themselves, supporting the idea that it would be more productive if Cambodian CSOs and IOs could work together to produce a common strategic vision identifying clear directions for CSOs, clear roles for CSOs and key focuses for CSOs so that they can be stronger, be in harmony and be better prepared in the future to respond to national and global development trends. In the meantime CSOs including IOs can improve their networking, increase and reinforce their solidarity and foster harmony among themselves so that they can build a strong voice to advocate on emerging issues in Cambodia particularly those that are related to the laws/regulation/policy formulation.

Following from what has been said, civil society organisations in Cambodia, including API and its partners and networks require to have a clear advocacy strategy for enhancing their efforts for policy engagement and change. This requires well coordinated, supported and sound policy to encourage and ensure effective participation and valid contributions to enable CSOs to continue their vital work in addressing the needs of Cambodia, particularly promoting human rights, democratic principles, people’s welfare and ensuring an enabling environment for sustainable development of Cambodia.

In short… In the current context of Cambodia, support to civil society is definitely a key priority for the near future, an essential element in the continuing process of democratizing the country. Despite the important efforts of many DPs in supporting CSOs since the 90s, civil society is not yet fully prepared to face the challenges entrenched in their emerging roles within the democratic space. The complexity and multiplicity of the roles that CSOs are called to play within the changing institutional and political context of Cambodia are still not reflected into the practices of civil society support.

Thank you… …Questions?