ADOPT A COMMUNITY FOR DEMOCRACY(CFD)
A Fund Raising Campaign of CCHR to Support its Community for Democracy Project
Nature of “Adopt a Community for Democracy”
The “Adopt a Community for Democracy (CfD)” is a fund-raising campaign to be launched and managed by CCHR to support its project entitled “Building Communities for Democracy in Cambodia,” or Community for Development (CfD) Project. The funds or donations raised from this campaign will be used to support the activities of CCHR’s local volunteers in strengthening people's capacity and network to monitor the implementation of government policies and human rights standards at local level, to collect peoples’ complaints and concerns, to facilitate assistance to the victims, and in providing support to community responses to the problems in their respective communes.
This campaign will encourage Cambodians abroad to provide donations to CCHR’s local volunteers or CfD Committees in specific communes, especially in their hometown or birthplace. The financial donations will be used primarily for the expenses of the local volunteers or CfD Committees in relation to their tasks towards CCHR and CfD activities. These expenses include, among others, communication expenses in reporting cases to CCHR for intervention, transportation expenses incurred in responding to human rights cases, and other expenses agreed by the local volunteers and CCHR. These procedures are set in the guidelines for CfD project implementation.
Aside from the financial contributions, the campaign will also accept donations in-kind which can be used by the local volunteers in their activities, such as sound systems, computer sets, mobile phones, electric generators, and many others.
Brief description of Community for Democracy (CfD) Project
The CfD Project is to build up a network among the grassroots people and to encourage people’s participation in the promotion of democracy and respect for human rights in Cambodia. By strengthening their capacity and building network of communities, the people will be able to exercise their democratic rights and political participation. The CfD network will be led by a core group composed of CCHR’s trained local volunteers, which will be later developed into a CfD Committee. This committee will be organized in the commune level.
The rationale of creating and strengthening this CfD network is in line with the government’s policy for decentralization in which the Law on Commune Administration and the holding elections of Commune Councils provide the Cambodian people to play a greater role in the process of decision-making that affect their lives.
As this decentralization is introduced into the Khmer way of life, challenges remain whether this Law on Commune Administration will bring changes to the lives of the people in the grassroots level. As the government said that the decentralization is “intended to improve management through democracy and good governance in order to upgrade the quality of life and giving more chances to citizens to take part in decisions affecting their own future, as well as, to ensure sustainable development and delivery of basic services,” it is therefore important to empower the rural Cambodians to participate fully in the development process.
Activities to achieve the CfD
CCHR will incorporate into its plan the following activities towards achieving the goals of CfD.
- Recruit and train commune-based local volunteers through community trainings, regular meetings, follow up visits, and provisions of educational materials. These local volunteers will be given the tasks to continue the education activities in his/her commune and encourage the people to join the CfD network. Any villager who believes and expresses his/her commitment to support the democracy and human rights may be recruited to become a member of CfD network.
- Educate and raise the awareness of the people in the community through organizing public forums, community dialogues, and other forms of community education activities. These activities are also aimed at encouraging more villagers to join the community networking.
- Involve the local volunteers in the services of CCHR such as monitoring government’s implementation of human rights standards in the local level, organizing of public forums, community dialogues, and pubic hearings. CfD members willing to do these tasks will be encouraged and may be promoted as CCHR’s local volunteers.
- Provide assistance to local volunteers in the establishment of structures and mechanisms to enable a functional community network. The network will be led by a Community for Democracy Committees (CfDCs) in the communes which will serve as the coordinating group of the community network in the commune. The process of creating the committee may be done through a gathering of local volunteers and interested villagers which will be facilitated by CCHR. The CfDC will have the following tasks:
- oversees the activities in the commune towards developing the commune into a full-pledged CfD;
- facilitates participation of the people in making decisions affecting the lives of the people in the commune, such as participation in the development planning initiated by local authorities and participation in political activities like election, etc.;
- facilitates collective actions in response to problems affecting a greater number of villagers such as violations of collective rights of the villagers, through their own initiatives or in cooperation with CCHR and other NGOs; and to respond to individual cases of human rights violations such as reporting of cases to CCHR and appropriate NGOs or to undertake initiative to protect and provide assistance the victims.
- Facilitate the organizing of CfDs into a network of communities.
The building and strengthening of CfDs is a continuous process and the development may vary from one commune to another. A commune is given a distinction of a full-pledged CfD when the following criteria are achieved: - majority of the villagers have sufficient understanding on human rights and democracy principles;
- villagers are actively supporting activities in promoting human rights through participation and active support to CCHR activities (public forums, investigation activities);
- positive achievements of the villagers in defending human rights issues in their communities;
- relative support from local authorities towards promotion of human rights and democracy such as declaration of principles in support to human rights, democracy, and development; and the CfDC is already functional. The local volunteers who will play a very important role in the process are expected to be members of the CfDCs.
Procedures for sending the donations
Donors are requested to send in their financial donations in whatever ways convenient for them. All donations shall be deposited in the account of CCHR intended for this purpose:
Account No. :
Account Name :
Bank Name :
Bank Address :
SWIFT :
Donations may be sent in also through credit card payments. Instructions for credit card payments will be posted at CCHR’s website.
If a donor wishes to give the donation to a specific commune, a following letter (post, email or fax) should be sent to CCHR to indicate the purpose of such donation.
Management of fund
The funds will be managed by CCHR through the Education Division which will oversee the activities of the local volunteers. Under the CfD project, the Education Division will set up mechanisms for reporting of activities by the local volunteers and disbursement of expenses under this fund.
The Education Division will regularly update the donors on the progress of CfD project by providing a list of communes and their respective activities in relation to the CfD project.
