National Evaluator Specialist: Realization of a Just and Inclusive Society

Consultant

Contract

This is a National Consultant contract. More about National Consultant contracts.

Background

The “Realization of a Just and Inclusive Society” started in 2018 and will end in December 2021. It was an upscaling intervention to the previous projects UNDP and partners had carried out in the areas of human rights, access to justice, gender equality and women’s empowerment, which could also enhance synergies among these areas and the different implementing partners and stakeholders The project aimed to contribute to national efforts to promote human rights for all Angolans, expand access to justice services, promote gender equality and women and girls’ empowerment . In this way, the project aimed to contribute to the acceleration, at sectoral level, of the implementation of Agenda 2030 in Angola, mainly the SDGs 16 and 5, in alignment with the National Development Plan (PDN) 2018-2022. The project was developed in a context of opening political space following the election of a new president in 38 years in the 2017 general elections, and the commitment of the new government to anticorruption, economic diversification and human rights and gender equality. Additionally, the project was embedded in the ongoing process of the reform of the national justice system.

The project planned to achieve the following three results: (1) strengthened national human rights framework capacity of national human rights institutions and human rights processes, mechanisms and spaces for human rights ; (2) strengthened capacity of bodies involved in the administration of justice, improved administration processes and law enforcement and increased access to justice by citizens ; (3) accelerated gender equality and women's empowerment, from the perspective of human rights, at the national, sectoral and local levels towards sustainable development.

The core of the project was a provision of technical assistance at policy level (upstream engagement) and at local level (provincial, municipal, and communal) through downstream engagement. By 2021, the project has had the following implementing partners and direct beneficiaries: Ministry of Justice and Human Rights (MINJUDH), Ombudsman’s Office (ProvJu), Ministry of Social Action, Family and Women’s Promotion (MASFAMU), Office of the Attorney General (PGR), Ministry of Interior (MININT), and Centre for Human Rights and Citizenship (CDHC) of the Catholic University. With the advent of Covid-19, the project delivery was significantly affected, particularly in the early 2020. However, this was also an opportunity to innovate in response to the human rights challenges posed by the pandemic, which led to new types of interventions that had not been previously planned.

Evaluation purpose, scope and objectives.

This evaluation seeks to access and capture evidence on the relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, and sustainability of the project in line with the national priorities as defined in the National Development Plan (PDN) 2018-2022, the United Nations Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF 2015-2019), the UNDP Country Program Document for Angola (CPD 2015-2019),UNDP Strategic Plan (SP 2017-2021), and the Agenda 2030 on Sustainable Development, particularly the SDGs 5 and 16. The evaluator or evaluation team is expected to produce an independent report on the extent the project has or not achieved the planned results and contributed to the results of the CPD, UNDAF, SP, PDN and SDGs 16 and 5, as well as offer wider lessons learned and recommendations for future UNDP human rights support in Angola. The assessment will contribute to the identification of the project's weaknesses and strengths based on the criteria described in the next section.

Evaluation, criteria and key questions

The evaluation will assess the following:

• The relevance and strategic positioning of UNDP support to Angola on human rights, gender equality and access to justice;
• The project strategy and framework UNDP developed to support Angola on human rights, gender equality and access to justice;
• Analysis of the progress made to date towards achieving the planned results, and lessons learned for future UNDP interventions in human rights in the country.

The evaluation seeks to answer the following key questions focused on relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, and sustainability.

Relevance:

• To what extent is the initiative in line with the UNDP mandate and national priorities?
• To what extent is UNDP support relevant to the achievement of the SDGs in the country?
• To what extent is UNDP engagement a reflection of strategic considerations, including the role of UNDP in a particular development context and its comparative advantage?
• To what extent was the method of delivery selected by the project appropriate to the development context?

Effectiveness:

• What have been the key results and how have they contributed to outcome-level progress?
• Have there been any unexpected results achieved beyond the planned outputs?
• To what extent have triangular and South-South cooperation and knowledge management contributed to the results attained?
• Which intervention areas are the most relevant and strategic for UNDP to consider going forward?

Efficiency:

• To what extent have the project outputs resulted from economic use of resources?
• To what extent were quality project outputs delivered on time?
• To what extent were partnership modalities conducive to the delivery of project outputs?
• To what extent have UNDP practices, policies, processes and decision-making capabilities affected the achievement of the project results?
• To what extent did the project engage or coordinate with beneficiaries, implementing partners, other United Nations agencies and national counterparts to achieve project results?

Sustainability:

• To what extent did UNDP establish mechanisms to ensure the sustainability of the project?
• To what extent do national partners have the institutional capacities, including sustainability strategies, in place to sustain the project results?
• To what extent do partnerships exist with other national institutions, NGOs, United Nations agencies, the private sector and development partners to sustain the attained results?

Methodology:

In view of the Covid-19 pandemic and the containment measures being adopted by the Angolan authorities, it may not be viable to travel into and/or within the country to conduct the evaluation. In such case, the evaluator(s) should design an evaluation methodology that takes this situation into account, with alternatives on how to conduct the evaluation remotely. The methodology should be based on an integrated approach involving a combination of data collection and analysis tools to generate concrete evidence to substantiate all findings. Evidence obtained and used to assess the project should be triangulated from a variety of sources, including verifiable data on indicator achievement, existing reports, evaluations and technical papers, stakeholder interviews, focus groups, surveys and site visits where/when possible. Accordingly to the evaluator(s)’s plan, it is expected that the evaluation methodology will comprise of the following elements:

Review documents (Desk Review);

• Interviews with key stakeholders including government line ministries, development partners, civil society and other relevant partners through a participatory and transparent process;
• Consultations with beneficiaries through interviews and/ or focus group discussions;
• Survey and/ or questionnaires where appropriate;
• Triangulation of information collected from different sources/methods to enhance the validity of the findings.

The evaluator(s) should perform the following tasks:

• Briefing: a briefing with UNDP project management team to share guidelines, expectations of the evaluation, to agree on the tasks to be performed by the evaluator and discuss evaluation needs in the field, such as set of interviews or any other logistic concern;

• Desk Review: analysis of UNPAF, UNDP CPD, UNDP SP, and targets of SDG 5 and 16; examination of all the relevant project documents (Project Document, Annual Reports, Activities Reports, etc).

Interviews: through an agreed set of interviews including:

• Presential or virtual interviews with key partners (MASFAMU, MINJUDH, MININT, PGR, Ombudsman, CDHC)
• Presential or virtual interviews with stakeholders and other institutions that benefited from the project
• Survey and questionnaires where appropriate

Duties and Responsibilities

Evaluation products (key deliverables):

The following reports and deliverables are required for evaluation:

• Inception Report: describing the methodology for undertaking the evaluation. It must contain a workplan and an evaluation schedule, proposed interviews and field visits, questionnaire to be implemented aligned with the ToRs and the four evaluation criteria i.e. relevance, effectiveness, efficiency and sustainability. The Inception Report will be discussed and agreed with UNDP Team.
• Draft Report: shared with UNDP Team for feedback towards the preparation of the Final Report.
• Presentation of key findings to key stakeholders: in person or virtual.
• An audit trail detailing how comments, questions and clarifications have been addressed in the Final Report.

The Final Evaluation Report should not exceed 25 pages, including all annexes and should be aligned with the suggested table of contents, as follows:

Title Table of contents Acronyms and abbreviations Executive summary Introduction Background and context Evaluation objective, purpose and scope Evaluability analysis Cross-cutting issues Evaluation approach and methodology Evaluation matrix/data analysis Findings and conclusions Lessons learned Recommendations Annexes

Evaluation team composition and required competencies:

• The evaluation will be undertaken by a national consultant/or team of consultants

Evaluation ethics:

• The evaluation must be carried out in accordance with the principles outlined in the United Nations Evaluation Group (UNEG)’s ‘Ethical Guidelines for Evaluation’ and sign the Ethical Code of Conduct for UNDP Evaluations (see Annex 1). Evaluators must be free and clear of perceived conflicts of interest. To this end, interested consultants will not be considered if they were directly and substantively involved, as an employee or consultant, in the formulation of UNDP strategies and programming relating to the outcomes and programmes/projects under review. The code of conduct and an agreement form to be signed by the consultant are included in Annex I.

Management and implementation arrangements:

• UNDP Country Office will support the implementation of presential or remote/virtual meetings. An updated stakeholder list with contact details (phone and email) will be provided by the Project Management Team to the evaluation Consultant.
• The project Management Team will arrange introductory presential or virtual meetings within the DRR, also to establish initial contacts with partners and project staff.
• The consultant/evaluator will take responsibility for setting up meetings and conducting the evaluation, subject to advanced approval of the methodology submitted in the Inception Report. The Project Management Team will develop a management response to the evaluation within two weeks of report finalization.
• The evaluation will use a system of ratings standardizing assessments proposed by the evaluator in the Inception Report. The evaluation acknowledges that rating cannot be a standalone assessment, and it will not be feasible to entirely quantify judgements. Performance rating will be carried out for the four evaluation criteria: relevance, effectiveness, efficiency and sustainability.
• The Project Management Team will provide support to assisting in setting virtual interviews.

Time frame for the evaluation process:

The evaluation is expected to take 20 working days for the Consultant, over a period of 4 weeks starting in June 14 - 9 July, 2021.

Competencies

Corporate Competencies:

• Demonstrates commitment to UN’s mission, vision and values;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.

Functional Competencies:

• Excellent skills in analysis, synthesis and oral and written communication (in Portuguese and English);
• Familiarity with the quality criteria on evaluation reports and the code of conduct for evaluating UNDP projects is an asset;
• Ability and experience in producing quality reports within the given time;
• • Excellent in human relations, coordination, planning and teamwork.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Master's degree (or equivalent) in Law, Social Sciences, Political Sciences, Sociology, Development Studies and in other corresponding areas.

Experience

• Minimum 5 years of professional experience in issues related to this project evaluation (human rights issues, gender equality, access to justice and the rule of law)
• Experience in research, analysis, monitoring and evaluation, particularly in Angola

Language requirements:

• Fluent in English and Portuguese

Submission process and basis for selection.

Interested consultants should provide their requested fee rates when they submit their expressions of interest in USD. The UNDP Country Office will then negotiate and finalize contracts. Fee payments will be made upon acceptance and approval by the UNDP Country Office of planned deliverables, based on the following payment schedule:

Inception report

20%

Draft Evaluation Report

30%

Final Evaluation Report

50%

Applicants are reviewed based on Required Skills and Experience stated above and based on the technical evaluation criteria outlined below. Applicants will be evaluated based on cumulative scoring. When using this weighted scoring method, the award of the contract will be made to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:

Being responsive / compliant / acceptable; and

Having received the highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the solicitation where technical criteria weighs 70% and Financial criteria / Proposal weighs 30%.

Technical Evaluation - Total obtainable points 100 points:

Criteria 1: Educational Qualification and 5 years of professional experience in issues related to the project evaluation, namely, human rights, access to justice, gender equality and women’s empowerment. Maximum Points: 20.

Criteria 2: Proven technical experience in conducting external project evaluations using different approaches and evaluations of government and international aid organizations. Maximum Points: 30.

Criteria 3: Demonstrated knowledge of the UN and its mandate in the Angola, and more specifically the work of UNDP in support of government and civil society in the Angola. Maximum Points: 30.

Criteria 4: Demonstrated knowledge of results-based management systems, and monitoring and evaluation methodologies; including experience in applying indicators and excellent reporting skills. Maximum Points: 20.

Financial Criteria: (30% of the total evaluation) based on the total all-inclusive lump sum amount for professional fee for tasks specified in this announcement

Having reviewed applications received, UNDP may invite qualified/ shortlisted candidates for interview.

Candidates obtaining a minimum of 70% (70 points) of the maximum obtainable points for the technical criteria (100 points) shall be considered for the financial evaluation.

Financial Evaluation - Total 30% (30 points)

Contract Award:

Candidate obtaining the highest combined scores in the combined score of Technical and Financial evaluation will be considered technically qualified and will be offered to enter into contract with UNDP.

Application Procedures

The application package containing the following (to be uploaded as one file):

• A cover letter with a brief description of why the Offer considers her/himself the most suitable for the assignment, and a summary of the understanding of the ToR;
• Personal CV, indicating all past experience from similar consultancy and specifying the relevant assignment period (from/to), as well as the email and telephone contacts of at least two (2) professional references.
• The financial proposal should specify an all-inclusive daily fee (based on a 7-hours working day - lunch time is not included - and estimated 20 days).

Methodology, and Timeline

The financial proposal must be all-inclusive and take into account various expenses that will be incurred during the contract, including: the daily professional fee; (excluding mission travel); living allowances at the duty station; communications, utilities and consumables; life, health and any other insurance; risks and inconveniences related to work under hardship and hazardous conditions (e.g., personal security needs, etc.), when applicable; and any other relevant expenses related to the performance of services under the contract.

In the case of unforeseeable travel requested by UNDP, payment of travel costs including tickets, lodging and terminal expenses should be agreed upon, between UNDP and Individual Consultant, prior to travel and will be reimbursed. In general, UNDP should not accept travel costs exceeding those of an economy class ticket. Should the IC wish to travel on a higher class he/she should do so using their own resources.

Ethical Code of Conduct for UNDP Evaluations

Evaluators:

Must present information that is complete and fair in its assessment of strengths and weaknesses so that decisions or actions taken are well founded Must disclose the full set of evaluation findings along with information on their limitations and have this accessible to all affected by the evaluation with expressed legal rights to receive results. Should protect the anonymity and confidentiality of individual informants. They should provide maximum notice, minimize demands on time, and: respect people’s right not to engage. Evaluators must respect people’s right to provide information in confidence and must ensure that sensitive information cannot be traced to its source. Evaluators are not expected to evaluate individuals and must balance an evaluation of management functions with this general principle. Sometimes uncover evidence of wrongdoing while conducting evaluations. Such cases must be reported discreetly to the appropriate investigative body. Evaluators should consult with other relevant oversight entities when there is any doubt about if and how issues should be reported. Should be sensitive to beliefs, manners and customs and act with integrity and honesty in their relations with all stakeholders. In line with the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, evaluators must be sensitive to and address issues of discrimination and gender equality. They should avoid offending the dignity and self-respect of those persons with whom they come in contact during the evaluation. Knowing that evaluation might negatively affect the interests of some stakeholders, evaluators should conduct the evaluation and communicate its purpose and results in a way that clearly respects the stakeholders’ dignity and self-worth. Are responsible for their performance and their product(s). They are responsible for the clear, accurate and fair written and/or oral presentation of study limitations, findings and recommendations.

Should reflect sound accounting procedures and be prudent in using the resources of the evaluation

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Added 2 years ago - Updated 2 years ago - Source: jobs.undp.org