Human Rights | NDC

Human Rights

Secretariat of the Human Rights & Good Governance

 

 

In July 2008, several European donors – namely Switzerland, Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands – entrusted the NGO Development Centre (“NDC”) with the establishment and management of the Human Rights and Good Governance (“HR/GG”) Secretariat.  The funding is a continuation of their support to the sector and aims to harmonize and channel financial and technical assistance through the NDC HR/GG Secretariat. The overall development objective of the support is to improve HR/GG in the oPt.

 In June 2009, the donors entrusted NDC again to manage the second phase of the HR/GG Secretariat for the period May 2010 to June 2013. On 6 May 2010, NDC signed an agreement with three donors – Switzerland, Sweden and the Netherlands – for an amount of USD $11.6 million for this purpose.  Hence, the funding for NGOs is made available to cover the period from May 2010 to end of December 2012. In December 2010, Denmark joined the Secretariat by signing a funding agreement with the NDC for USD 4.6 million. By signing this agreement, the total funding for the second phase of the Secretariat which continues until June 2013, reaches USD 16.2 million.  

 

Channelling of Funds

The Grants component targets Palestinian and Israeli HR/GG NGOs which promote, support, protect, and monitor the observance of human rights and good governance in the oPt. Two different types of granting mechanisms to HR/GG NGOs are available; Core Funding Grants and the Small Grant Facility. For the second phase of this program, NDC has selected 41 NGOs from the West Bank/Gaza and Israel (28 grants for core funding and 13 through the small grant facility). 

 

Strategic Sector Development

The Secretariat/NDC will administer a separate “Sector Development” budget provided by the donors to facilitate and support coordinated initiatives and joint capacity building initiatives by the non-governmental HR/GG sector and/or other stakeholders, including networks and/or coalitions and joint initiatives of HR/GG NGOs in the oPt.

 

Policy Dialogue

The HR/GG Sector Policy Dialogue Program will provide a platform for NGOs within the sector to meet and discuss common issues of concern through conducting a set of issue-based workshops that will target the sector as a whole. NDC will facilitate the workshops and act as catalyst to stimulate the process of dialogue and identification of means of mutual cooperation.