Uganda, like many developing countries, suffered from poor quality basic service provision and weak mechanisms for accountability at the local level. At the time, Uganda had a relatively strong track record in budget transparency, and is ranked second in Africa in the Open Budget Index. However, these efforts have not been systematic, and it is unclear to which extent they have improved accountability. Due to a 2010 reform, the Ministry of Finance receives detailed project-by-project reports on budget allocations and alleged quarterly expenditures from local governments via an output based digital budget reporting tool. However, local stakeholders, including elected representatives whose mandate it is to monitor service provision, are largely unaware of this information.
To help address this problem, the Ugandan Ministry of Finance, ACODE, ODI, and IPA launched a Budget Transparency Initiative to make department, project- and location-specific budget information available to politicians, opinion leaders, and the public; and to mobilize them to monitor and provide feedback on the spending and services provided by government institutions.