Initiative for Social and Economic Rights (ISER)

Context

Initiative for Social and Economic Rights (ISER) is a nationwide organisation with a regional focus. ISER’s mission is to promote the effective understanding, monitoring, implementation, accountability and ensuring full realisation of social and economic rights in Uganda. ISER has adopted a multi-faceted approach in promoting and protecting social and economic rights in Uganda. We combine advocacy, research and documentation, public information and community empowerment, and capacity building.

Current projects include: 

Website
www.iser-uganda.org

Area of Work
Africa

Contact Person
Angella Nabwowe

• Promoting Social and Economic Rights in Uganda (Specific focus on the right to health, as it relates to the delivery of National Minimum Health Care Package): This project focuses on the delivery of the National Minimum Health Care Package (NMHCP) introducing the principles of universal access, 
• Equality and non-discrimination in Uganda’s public debate to promote accountability and a human rights based approach to healthcare service delivery. Accordingly, ISER conducts research, documentation and legal and policy analysis that form the basis for evidence based advocacy, including strategic litigation.

• Innovations for Civic Engagement in Social and Economic Rights Advocacy in Uganda: This is a pilot project aimed at enhancing community participation to demand for social and economic services in Uganda. Funded by the Open Society Initiative for Eastern Africa (OSIEA), this project is being implemented in two sub counties in Kayunga District. The project is about leveraging Short Message Service (SMS) Technology to support access to information. It is largely an sms platform, complimented by community dialogues and radio talk shows. The sms application enables communities to access information relating to health services and to report back through a given contact. The system enables communities to share information that is relevant to holding the government accountable for health services.
• Demystifying Social and Economic Rights in Uganda: This project consists of a series of systematic and coordinated  activities designed to enhance the recognition and realization of social and economic rights in Uganda through capacity building for key stakeholders, legal and policy advocacy, strategic litigation and awareness raising.
  Funded by the Finnish NGO Foundation for Human Rights (KIOS), the overall outcome of the project is a significant shift in the understanding, recognition and accountability for social and economic rights in Uganda. This will entail a situation where social and economic rights have become a subject of public discussion, with policy makers and communities beginning to understand social and economic rights as entitlements, with improved legal and policy framework, accountability, and public participation in government processes.

Approaches to implementing Community monitoring/ accountability

By documentation where citizens themselves send information about the challenges in public health care using a text messaging service. The information goes directly to the service providers with a copy to ISER for follow up purposes. We also use a lot of community dialogues where citizens directly engage service providers.

Results and Lessons

We only begun implementation this year so it is difficult to talk about results and achievements at the moment.