WHAT WE DO
Parliamentary Network Africa is a parliamentary monitoring civil society organisation promoting open parliament across Africa. The Accra-based organisation begun as an advocacy newspaper (Parliamentary News) in 2015 intended to bridge the communication gap between legislators and citizens across Africa. As an advocacy newspaper it reports on what happens within the Parliament of Ghana and carried general concerns of the public to legislators in order to inform their decisions.
Since December 2017 PNAfrica has operated as a Parliamentary Monitoring Organisation (PMO) working with Parliaments across Africa and civil society organisations to ensure parliamentary openness, inclusiveness, and transparency and accountability.
Our four core focus areas are as follows:
we support Parliaments and committees of parliaments, and provide technical assistance to PMOs to better enhance Parliaments legislative, oversight and representational functions. We also support Parliaments to develop and implement Open Parliament Action Plans, as we access the performance of national parliaments in discharging their duties. We engage in capacity building initiatives for MPs and staff of Parliaments, and monitor/track draft legislations (Bills) in parliament.
We work at protecting the right of journalists reporting from various Parliaments and provide them support and capacity building to better report on the legislature. Believing in the fundamental human right of citizens’ access to information, we have been very instrumental in Ghana’s journey towards having a Right to Information law passed, as we served as convenor for the Media Coalition on Right to Information. Additionally, we co-publish the _Parliamentary Newspaper_ which is a sub-regional niche publication aimed at bringing information from Parliaments to citizens living across the world, while we also take citizens and CSO advocacy campaigns to MPs. We are vigorous at promoting the concept of ‘Democratisation of Parliamentary Information’ as we believe that persons living everywhere (whether marginalised or irrespective of their peculiar situation) must have access to information on what their Parliaments do on their behalf
Our Accountability, Livelihoods & Inclusiveness work stream allows us to work with anti-corruption organisations by supporting their actions and legislative advocacies. We champion the need for MPs to account to their constituents regularly, and facilitate linkages between MPs and the people they represent on the very issues that affect the livelihood of citizens. In effect, we seek to have Parliaments that leaves no one behind.
We build and support networks of parliamentary monitoring organisations (PMOs) and provide trainings on parliamentary advocacy across the continent. Our ‘Open Parliament Outreach Series’, ‘Bill Symposium Series’ and ‘Parliamentary Dialogue Series’ initiatives brings people together to share knowledge of various aspects of parliamentary work across the Continent. We are credited as the “go-to source on African Parliaments”