TRANSPARENT ACCOUNTABLE GOVERNANCE
The Foundation works with 16 cities in Mindanao to convene stakeholders from city governments, the business sector, and civil society to pursue the common goal of transparent accountable government (TAG). In August 2007, more than 100 participants in the project gathered to assess the past five years of the project. The program was co-organized by the League of Cities of the Philippines, Mindanao Business Council, and the Mindanao Coalition for Development NGOs; it examined accomplishments, which have included reducing time to issue a Mayor’s Business Permit to a half day from seven days; increasing the number of issued Business Permits by 35 percent; increasing business tax compliance by 40 percent; improving collection efficiency of real property taxes by 60 percent; and reducing the prices paid for drugs, medicines, and medical supplies by more than half. Given this positive impact on compliance and revenue, the Foundation is now extending the project to the rest of the Philippines.
ELECTIONS OBSERVATION
The Foundation worked to improve the conduct of the May 2007 general and local elections by increasing support for domestic election observation through more than 400,000 volunteers deployed by the Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting, along with 12 Muslim NGOs in Mindanao. The Foundation coordinated with the Asian Network for Free Elections (ANFREL) to bring accepted international observers from Bangladesh, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Thailand to supplement domestic observers in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. The Department of Education and the Commission on Elections, which administers polling places, created a manual for the teachers. Surveys and media coverage revealed that the 2007 elections accurately reflected the will of the citizenry. Despite the challenges of implementing such a large program in a short timeframe, this unprecedented election monitoring made a significant contribution to increasing the transparency, and consequently the integrity, of the Philippines election process.