External Re-advertisement : Local Governance and Decentralization Specialist, NOC, TA, based in Bertoua, Cameroon for 6 Months (For Cameroonian Nationals Only)

Contract

This is a NO-3 contract. This kind of contract is known as National Professional Officers. It is normally only for nationals. It's a staff contract. More about NO-3 contracts.

UNICEF works in some of the world’s toughest places, to reach the world’s most disadvantaged children. To save their lives. To defend their rights. To help them fulfill their potential.

Across 190 countries and territories, we work for every child, everywhere, every day, to build a better world for everyone.

And we never give up.

For every child, a chance in life!

UNICEF has been working in Cameroon since 1975 in order to allow women and children to fully realize their rights to development without restriction, as enshrined in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. UNICEF provides financials and technical support to Cameroon across seven areas in an effort to fully realize the rights of women and children. These areas include Health, HIV/AIDS, Water-sanitation-Hygiene, nutrition, education, child protection and social inclusion. UNICEF focuses mainly on children and the most vulnerable and excluded families. Cameroon 2020 population is estimated at 26,545,863 people according to UN data. The population is young and generates strong socioeconomic demand. In rural areas, limited access to basic social services and effects of climate changes lead to household impoverishment and severe child deprivations. The task is immense but not insurmountable; it requires the energy of all stakeholders in Cameroon and out of Cameroon: also, women, men, youth and children, government, technical and financial partners, donors, civil society, the private sector, parliamentarians, communities. Everyone is invited to take part in the struggle to meet the challenges that lie ahead. It is together that we will act for Cameroon, a country which summarizes the challenges and hopes of Africa.

How can you make a difference?

The Local Governance and Decentralization Specialist principal supervisor is the Chief Social Policy on the technical level and with day to-day operational function to be supervised by the Chief of Field Office. The incumbent will operate in a matrix management model, where she/he will support strategic engagement in local governance and decentralization, which includes scaling up efforts on programme integration across the programme sectors (i.e nutrition, child protection, education) guided by relevant Chief of Sections, managed by Chief of Social Policy and field level delivery of integrated programme implementation and partnership building by the Chief of Field Office.He/She workplan and performance indicators will be collectively agreed upon and reviewed together with feedback provided by both supervisors. The Chief of Social policy will lead the performance review with the determination of the final rating.

Support to programme development and planning

• Lead efforts to increase and enhance access to reliable and affordable social services; policy adherence at the local level; promotion of community participation in local governance decision-making and support participatory and accountable local governance.
• To provide leadership and technical expertise in local governance areas and work closely with the relevant regional and municipality authorities in local level planning and monitoring for results within the Commune Development Plans (CDPs).
• Technical and operational support to programme implementation
• Integrated Programme Delivery
• Provides effective support to overall management of the local governance and decentralization programme focusing on quality control from formulation to implementation.
• Advise government institutions on the development of decentralization implementation policies, work plans, and systems.
• Develop system and platform for inter-sectorial coordination at municipality level to improve capacity for integrated delivery of essential interventions.
• Supervise and monitor community cohesion related work across and provide technical advice to ensure the achievement of quality results.
• Support efforts towards government decentralization in social service sectors, while offering an opportunity to strengthen district level systems and promote local accountability.
• Working across internal sectors and with municipality authorities, support the process for multi-sectoral approach to service delivery.
• Local Planning and Budgeting and Fiscal Decentralization (Public Finance for Children)
• Engage with districts on child sensitive public finance tracking and influencing fiscal decentralization to leverage resources at district.
• Working across the sectors, ensure that districts have the available data for programme budgeting, management, and implementation.
• Facilitate the strengthening of local governance structures to encourage joint and inclusive approaches for results for women and children at the local level.
• Identify capacity needs of district partners and support the design and implementation of Commune Development Plan (CDP).
• Ensure that project lessons learned, and best practices are captured, documented, and periodically shared.
• Take appropriate action to resolve issues and/or refer to relevant officials for resolution. Report on critical issues, bottlenecks, and potential problems for timely action to achieve results.

Programme management, monitoring and delivery of results

• Lead on the design and formulation of support to decentralized structures, cutting across all sectors, and working with local Government authorities and other development partners in the design and coordination on approach.
• Prepare documentation for programme reviews and analytical statements on progress and constraints of country programme outcome and output results.

Networking, partnership building and coordination

• Strengthen relationship and enhance coordination with key actors in the regional and municipality public agencies across relevant actors.
• Build and strengthen strategic and mutual partnerships with key regional and municipalities government actors.
• Build and sustain close working partnerships with government counterparts and national stakeholders through active sharing of information and knowledge to facilitate programme implementation and build capacity of stakeholders to achieve and sustain output results.
• Participate in inter-agency meetings/events on programming to collaborate with inter-agency partners/colleagues to support outcomes towards the UN Joint cooperation framework, to integrate and harmonize UNICEF output results and implementation strategies.
• Build and reinforce the commitment towards institutional capacity strengthening of the local partners including government authorities

Innovation, knowledge management and capacity building

• Apply and introduce innovative approaches and good practices to build the capacity of partners and stakeholders, and to support the implementation and delivery of concrete and sustainable programme results
• Keep abreast, research, benchmark, and implement best practices in local governance and decentralization. Assess, institutionalize, and share best practices and knowledge learned.
• Promotes partnership and collaboration with various stakeholders, including local governments, civil society, UN in order to get their adherence to collect and disseminate child-related data and knowledge on good practices and lessons learned and exchanges information on programme implementation, with focus on excluded and marginalized children
• Contribute to the development and implementation of policies and procedures to ensure optimum efficiency and efficacy of sustainable programmes and projects.

To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have

1. EDUCATION

• An advanced university degree (Master's or higher) degree in one of the following fields is required political science, economics, public policy, governance, public administration management or related field.
• An advanced university degree in a relevant field will be considered as an asset.

2. WORK EXPERIENCE

• A minimum of five years of professional experience providing policy advice and programme support in the general area of Local Governance, Local Development and Decentralization in different development contexts.
• Demonstrated knowledge of the legal and regulatory frameworks for local governance.
• Understanding of local governance structure, government policies, guidelines, legislation, and strategies
• Understanding of Rights-based and Results-based approach and programming.
• Understanding of UN mission and system; and International Code of Conduct.
• Gender equality and diversity awareness.
• Strong experience in providing technical assistance to local governments, including through participatory approaches

3. LANGUAGES

• Fluency in both English and French is preferred.

For every Child, you demonstrate...

UNICEF's values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, and Accountability (CRITA) and core competencies in Communication, Working with People and Drive for Results.

To view our competency framework, please visit here.

Click here to learn more about UNICEF’s values and competencies.

UNICEF is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages all candidates, irrespective of gender, nationality, religious and ethnic backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities, to apply to become a part of the organization.

UNICEF has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UNICEF, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. UNICEF also adheres to strict child safeguarding principles. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles and will therefore undergo rigorous reference and background checks. Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check.

Remarks:

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process.