Breeze FM has created a radio platform that allows listeners to help monitor how the provincial government is spending its budget and implementing projects in the Eastern Province of Zambia.
The radio station developed the project, which runs until 2015, in partnership with Hivos Southern Africa to provide a regular platform for government officials to explain to the public what projects are being undertaken each budgetary year and how they are being implemented.
Local government officials appear on a weekly live phone-in discussion programme called “Budget Tracking through Radio”.
The station also gives a voice to the public by organising community and district visits and asking for their reaction to the explanations given by officials. Members of the public are able to express their views on how government projects carried out during each budgetary year are implemented in their area.
Breeze FM also produces and broadcasts news and other programmes based on the observations of the public and the station’s reporters.
The overall goals of the project are to provide a platform for the provincial government to explain how provincial resources are allocated, while at the same time encouraging members of the public to participate in the process of tracking and monitoring the implementation of the government budget.