By the Botswana Council of NGOs (Bocongo) Secretariat, Programs & PR Departments, member of Forus in Botswana 

On December 11th, 2020, the Botswana Council of Non-Governmental Organizations (BOCONGO), which is the umbrella body for civil society in Botswana, signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Business Botswana, an association representing employers and the business community in all sectors of the economy. The MoU was signed in Gaborone, as a guiding document for implementation, supported by Forus. 

Capacity building for fundraising 

The MoU was the first step towards a partnership with the business community hinged on addressing financial challenges experienced by NGOs in Botswana by ensuring that they explore additional mechanisms to boost their financial stability, and ultimately, their independence and sustainability. By virtue of NGOs receiving financial support from different stakeholders of the private sector, it was necessary to include in the MoU an aspect of a joint fight against corruption and economic crime. A national anti-corruption committee was formed, composed of representatives from the public sector, the private sector and civil society; to guide the implementation of anti-corruption activities and to create an enabling environment for whistle blowing.  

BOCONGO member organisations have been experiencing significant challenges in the area of resource mobilisation over the years. This has largely been an outcome of the declaration of Botswana as an Upper Middle-income country in 2009. This development resulted in the drying of many traditional funding streams. Currently, the most active NGOs are funded by the government, and this severely impacts the integrity of NGOs as watchdogs of the public sector. In order to overcome this compromising reality, BOCONGO saw it fit to have a partnership model with the business community for independent and sustainable funding of NGOs.  

The parties are currently working on implementing the objects of the MoU which includes joint lobbying for the development of a Corporate Social Investment (CSI) Act to enable a guiding legislative framework for the funding of NGOs by the private sector and creating an anti-corruption policy document for civil society to regulate coordinated donations received by NGOs from the private sector.

It was a challenging process because COVID 19 affected a lot of activities, some of which were ultimately hosted through virtual platforms, but the partnership came at a relevant and opportune time, because the joint lobbying of government by civil society in partnership with the private sector is long overdue.