Caucasus Research Resource Center: Strengthening Good Governance, Accountability and Public Participation in Azerbaijan

Deadline: 25 June 2019

Caucasus Research Resource Center – Georgia has announced an open solicitation process for service providers in the framework of the program of strengthening good governance, accountability and public participation funded by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

The general purpose of the application for this service offer is to strengthen the capacity of citizens to improve citizen-government cooperation and to strengthen public oversight, effective campaigns and public advocacy.

Themes

Service suggestions should focus on the following 2 themes and related sub-titles that are based on this common goal:

Increased access to justice for the population
- Improving the quality of legal assistance to the population, ensuring the right of citizens to receive quality legal assistance in various areas; Enhancing access to legal assistance for vulnerable and socially vulnerable groups of population, as well as enlightenment and public advocacy activities to increase access to justice;
- Increasing the legal knowledge of citizens in the rule of law, establishing close cooperation with the relevant government agencies and strengthening the public control of the citizens;
- Advocacy, equality before the law, independence of the judiciary, transparency, and efficiency of advocacy, initiatives to prevent discrimination of all kinds (sexual, racial, social status, etc.) at trial and access to justice; Implementation of public advocacy activities in order to ensure equality before the law and improve legislation in this direction.
Increase citizen participation in the decision-making process and the implementation of state programs
- Preparation and implementation of public advocacy campaigns, involving citizens and community representatives in drafting policy documents;
- Achieving wider citizen participation through the use of modern information and communication technologies;
- Increasing citizen participation through the innovative approach and introduction of new technologies by local and national media and its representatives.

Grant Information

The total cost of service offers should not exceed 20,000 AZN.
Proposed service offerings should be made within maximum 12 months.

Topics

Service offerings, which logically and effectively cover one or more of these topics, will be preferred during the selection process:

Gender Approach – Applicants should ensure that gender issues are considered in their service offer package. This is to ensure that both male and female stakeholders participate in the proposed activities and systematically incorporate all gender equality issues into the service delivery methodology.
Regional coverage – Applicants should not only be content with Baku and Absheron in their service offer packages, but should also include proposals covering other regions of Azerbaijan.
Multilateral cooperation – Applicants must take into account the involvement of experts in their service offerings, and should cooperate closely with government agencies at national and local levels. Where appropriate, business representatives and interested groups (eg community members, farmers, different occupational holders, women, youth, communities, etc.) should be involved. The above-listed issues should be clearly and clearly stated in the service pack.
Innovativeness – The Service Suggestions package should not be the overlapping ideas and activities, offer new services and activities for the benefit of target groups, and put a new approach to solving the problems in the service offer.
Sustainability – The continuity of the results provided during the preparation of the Service Package must be taken into account and clearly and clearly reflected in the service offer package.

Criteria

Individuals and limited liability companies that are taxpayers meeting the criteria of eligibility shown below may submit a service offer package within this application:
- Suitability criteria for limited liability societies (LLCs):
  - Applicants should have at least 1 year of experience in similar services;
  - Applicants should not have any debts to government agencies;
  - The applicant LLC, its key staff, specialists and directors should not be involved in any investigation or prosecution of any civil, administrative, criminal or tax issues and should not have a court order.
- Criteria for compliance with candidates for individuals:
  - Applicants must register as a taxpayer physical person;
  - Applicants must have at least 1 year experience in the implementation of the services provided in the package;
  - Applicants should not have any debt to the State Social Protection Fund, the Tax Department, and other government agencies;
  - The applicants should not be involved in any judicial, administrative, criminal or tax trials or court trials.
- Applicant and service providers – team members can offer only one service offer package within the application for this service offer. Otherwise all appeals of the applicant or team members will be denied.