Rural self-government programme brings hope to poor communities

"We are happy because we have a new school, we have two computers and a TV and we have many new books," Nargiza and Nigora, two schoolgirls dressed in crisp school uniforms, told IRIN in the village of Alimtepe in the southern province of Osh. Nowadays such optimism is not unusual in villages where the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) local self-government programme is operating. The scheme involves villagers forming local councils to prioritise new development projects. The councils, known as Aiyl Okmotus, work with local government bodies and international organisations to implement new projects of benefit to the village. "The main aim of the programme is to unite people and government organs, which in its turn increases the direct participation of local people in the development of villages. But we try to prevent a dependency culture emerging, when people always wait for external help to resolve their problems," Olga Grebennikova, UNDP Kyrgyzstan's public affairs officer, told IRIN. The self-governance programme has been operating since 1998 in pilot villages in Osh, Talas and Djalalabad provinces. The scheme works by decentralising authority, and for this reason met some early resistance from Soviet-style provincial authorities. In the early days of the programme, local government administrations did not welcome the activities of UN volunteers who worked to gather local people together in order to explain how the scheme could benefit them. "Fortunately, local administrations today are in general more tolerant of us. But recently they created some problems in places where we do not go, but now they see the results and have started to cooperate with us," according to Sharipidin Tairov, a UN volunteer in the First of May Village in the Karasu district of Osh region, where villagers built a new school, a public bath house and a local medical centre. Last year, UNDP and the Kyrgyz authorities signed an agreement on decentralisation and local self-government. Last year, 116 projects were successfully implemented in villages throughout Kyrgyzstan, with total UNDP assistance of US $22,000. After training and meetings with UN volunteers, local people start to create community groups, which then go on to formulate projects, such as new water pumps or school extensions. After raising what money they can locally, they then apply for additional financial assistance from UNDP and other international organisations. "We gathered 10-20 soms [about $0.2-0.5] from each family. It is not too much, but you see that together this money can make huge things. We created our jamaat [community organisation] from local teachers. It is called Mechta [dream], because our dream was to have a new school," Zamirahon, a teacher at the local school in Alimtepe village, told IRIN. "Now we have a micro credit system, where we do not have to pay high interest rates. Although I am not an educated person, I know that if my jamaat will work out a good project, and defend it to the grant committee, we can get money to do cattle breeding," said Bolot, from Asanchek village in Mady rural municipality. But in places where the UN-backed project has yet to reach, there was scepticism from local people. "I think that borrowing is not good, because then you have to pay interest, but that is often impossible. Moreover, there is huge corruption in local administrations," said Januzak, from Atchy village. But an ethnic Uzbek farmer from the same village was quick to spot a possible business opportunity. "Only lazy people can say such things. We want to propose a project to get credit to open a mill," said Adham.