| Grant Profile: |
| Project Title: |
Support to the Registration of the Veterans of the Civilian Resistance in Timor-Leste |
| PCF/LICUS/SPF: |
PCF |
Status: |
Closed |
| File Number: |
310
| Region: |
EAP |
| Sector: |
Law and justice and public administration |
Country: |
East Timor |
| FY approved: |
2005 |
Grant Theme : |
Social protection and risk management |
| Keyword(s): |
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Approved Amount: |
$500,000.00 |
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Grant Recipient:
Comisspo para os Assuntos dos Quadros da Resistencia (CAQR, Commission on Cadres of the Resistance) |
Grant Purpose:
Unresolved grievances among veterans are a prime cause of fragile states experiencing renewed conflict. The overall objective of the project is therefore to complete the process of identifying and registering all of Timor-Leste’s veterans, so that they may be recognized and assisted by the State.
The intermediate objectives include:
(i) the formulation of a definition of a veteran of the civilian resistance and criteria for registration;
(ii) the identification and registration of civilian veterans;
(iii) creation of a database of registered civilian veterans.
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Grant Activities:
The project is divided into the following components:
Component 1: Preparation
This component entails:
(1) Establishment of essential management tools and structures - developing action plans and budgets, recruiting staff and appointing district level commissioners;
(2) Development of a draft questionnaire and a draft set of criteria;
(3) Training for staff, including district level commissioners.
Component 2: Consultation, public information and creation of the questionnaire
This component entails:
(1) Consultation with the public regarding the draft questionnaire, definition and criteria;
(2) Concurrent provision of initial information at the district level regarding the CAQR and its work;
(3) Re-drafting of the questionnaire, definition, and criteria based on the public consultations;
(4) Printing of the questionnaires;
(5) Creation of a database for the registration process. It is anticipated that the public information and media activities will be carried on throughout the life of the project.
Component 3: Registration, verification and data entry
This component includes:
(1) Registration field work at the community level, planned and executed by the district and sub-district commissioners;
(2) Verification and correction of the completed questionnaires at the district level before transmission to Dili;
(3) Entry of data into the database on an ongoing basis;
(4) Publication of provisional lists;
Following registration, the Comisspo para os Assuntos dos Quadros da Resistencia (Commission on Cadres of the Resistance - CAQR) will publicly post lists of those who have registered. This posting of lists will afford people the opportunity to review and correct their personal data if they have registered; come forward to register if they have not already; or comment on the claims of those who have registered. Rather than waiting until the registration is completed to post provisional lists, the CAQR intends to produce lists on an ongoing basis.
(5) Writing of final reports and final evaluation.
The final stage of the4 CAQR process will be the preparation and writing of a final report and a financial report, as well as a final evaluation. The final reports will be submitted to the President, for further consideration by Parliament and Government. The evaluation will look not only at the CAQR process itself, but also at the entire process of veterans policy preparation.
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Results:
(1) The activity has achieved its objective. Through the CAQR process 36,606 former members of the civilian resistance were registered, including 9,796 women.
(2) A successful consultation process regarding criteria to be considered as a civilian veteran was carried out in all 13 districts, involving a total of 1,346 people, 35 percent of whom were women.
(3) CAQR was successful in its particular efforts to reach women and youth.
(4) The CAQR data has been merged with the data from the previous veterans commissions û the CAAC-CAVF. With the passage of Timor-Leste’s veterans law, Estatuto dos Combatentes da Libertacao Nacional, in March 2006, it is anticipated that this data will be used as a basis for ceremonies of recognition starting in August 2006.
(5) The drafting of the law and policy work to date has been based on the public consultations and registration processes run by the CAAC-CAVF and the CAQR. However several very important areas of veterans policy remain to be defined. Additionally the law has yet to be publicly presented to communities.
(6) The objectives were clear, realistic, and indisputably critical to the political stability of the country. The consultations run by the first veterans commissions, the CAAC-CAVF, highlighted the very strong community demand for veterans of the civilian resistance to be identified and recognized, along with those from the armed resistance.
(7) There has been no significant social unrest due to veterans’ grievances since the start of the veterans commission process with the launch of the CAAC-CAVF in 2002, and the CAQR has contributed to the consolidation of this stability.
(8) Recognizing the critical importance of veterans issues, the Bank and other donors have integrated progress on veterans issues into the results matrix of the Consolidation Support Program, the primary forum for policy dialogue and donor coordination in Timor-Leste. The Bank has also included veterans issues in its Country Assistance Strategy and associated results matrix, approved by Board in July 2005.
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Lessons Learned:
(1) In supporting such processes in post-conflict environments where the policy-making process itself is not well established, the Bank can help by fostering early understanding of how data can serve as the basis for policy and the different aspects of the policy-making process.
(2) Ensure adequate communication and outreach efforts throughout the life of such processes, appropriate to different audiences.
(3) In low-capacity, post-conflict environments assistance mechanisms should be as flexible as possible.
(4) At the launch of such processes consider training also in survey methodologies and formulation of criteria, categories, and classifications.
(5) Attention must be devoted from the outset to how the results of community processes will be translated into policy results.
(6) Care needs to taken during the planning stages to think through the challenges involved in recognizing civilian structures and the most effective means of targeting particular groups, including women and youth.
(7) Ensure thorough understanding, through up-front training, of technical tools such as databases and their use. The entire veterans policy formulation process was at times hampered by a lack of comprehension on the part of commissioners about the functioning and uses of the database.
(8) Timely and transparent registration of veterans of a conflict is the first step in creating a veterans policy and can also yield immediate and tangible returns in stability.
(9) Developing policy and law after registration can effectively discourage exaggerations of service.
(10) Public participation has been a notable strength of the CAQR. The CAQR was successful in gaining the participation of organizations purporting to represent veterans, and drawing them into the process. The CAQR was also careful not to raise expectations amongst the community regarding financial assistance.
(11) The importance of a coordinated approach to veterans issues that involves planning, sequencing of activities, and data collection that is systematic and targeted, cannot be overemphasized.
(12) It is important that veterans policy development takes place within the context of an assessment of the needs of other vulnerable groups who are not veterans, to avoid perceptions of discrimination and inequity.
(13) Timor Leste’s experience demonstrates the need to ensure that the data collected is accurate and complete before recognition ceremonies are conducted. Recognition ceremonies that are based on incomplete information could be counterproductive, and could damage the credibility of the registration processes, possibly leading to further grievances and tensions.
(14) The importance of a realistic time frame, adequate staffing and security for future registration processes, to ensure thorough data collection and verification processes, cannot be overestimated.
Key challenges:
(1) The imposition of an unrealistic time frame impacted upon each phase of the project.
(2) The registration process was affected by the difficulty of mapping the complex structure of the civilian resistance, in which ranks and roles were not always clear.
(3) These issues, and the fact that the questionnaire used for registrations was extremely complex, resulted in a high percentage of errors being entered into the CAQR database.
(3) While the CAQR attempted to have stronger communication with stakeholders in Government and Parliament than the CAAC-CAVF, this proved difficult and did not significantly influence the legal drafting process.
(4) The fact that the CAQR database and the CAAC-CAVF database were designed by different programmers and had completely different designs created unnecessary difficulties in merging the two databases.
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