Fostering Change

Empowering communities for inclusive

and sustainable development through
social mobilisation

Refugee Affected and Hosting Areas Programme (RAHA)

With funding by the European Union

 Preamble
T he Refugee Affected and Hosting Areas
Programme (RAHA) means hope for the
men, women and children who are benefitting
from its various interventions since it fully
supports them in realising their maximum
potential through an exclusive social
mobilisation methodology.
comprising members of at least 70% of the
village households, RAHA social mobilisation
teams engage the community members in an
analysis of their situation using techniques and
tools such as including pair-wise ranking,
participatory rural appraisal, resource constraint
analysis and needs-assessment exercise.

UNDP is the UN’s global development network, advocating for change and connecting countries through knowledge, The programme, based on a participatory and
experience and resources to help people build a better life. We are on the ground in 166 countries, working with
people on their own solutions to global and national development challenges.
bottom-up approach, follows a three-tier social
mobilisation methodology, starting with
As countries develop local capacity, they draw on the support of UNDP and our wide range of partners. World leaders community organisations that later cluster into
have pledged to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, including the overarching goal of cutting poverty in half
by 2015. UNDP’s network links and coordinates global and national efforts to reach these Goals. Our focus is helping
village organisations and, finally, local support
countries build and share solutions to the challenges of: organisations to assume a large developmental
role in their respective areas.
 Democratic Governance
 Poverty Reduction
 Crisis Prevention and Recovery RAHA activities start with the programme's
 Energy and Environment social mobilisation teams visiting different
 HIV/AIDS villages in the target union councils. These
UNDP helps developing countries attract and use aid effectively. In all our activities, we encourage the protection teams interact with the local communities to
of human rights and the empowerment of women. apprise them of the benefits of forming
community organisations for possible solutions
to their problems. Due to the tireless efforts of
these teams, until August 2013, more than 2,000
community organisations with about 300,000
direct beneficiaries have been formed under the
programme.
After the formation or rejuvenation of separate
men's and women's community organisations
Alongside, RAHA organises training events,
such as Community Management Skills Training
and Leadership Management Skills Training for
members and office-bearers of the community
organisations to build their capacity to
implement and monitor small and medium
community physical infrastructure projects.
Until August 2013, more than 2,000 and 600
members and office-bearers of the community
organisations have been imparted Community
Management Skills Training and Leadership
Management Skills Training, respectively, and
they are now serving their communities.
Based on the needs prioritisation done by the
communities, RAHA facilitates them in
developing and implementing small and medium
community physical infrastructure projects to
cater to the most urgent need of their area. For
bigger projects, two or more community
organisations of a village join hands.

This document has been produced with the financial assistance of the European Union. The views
expressed herein can in no way be taken to reflect the official opinion of the European Union.

Copyright © 2013
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)
Refugee Affected and Hosting Areas Programme (RAHA)

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in
any form or by any means – electronic, mechanic, photocopying, recording or otherwise – without prior
permission of UNDP.

Editor: Mustafa Nazir Ahmad (Media and Communication Officer, RAHA)

Text: Mahvesh Khan (Senior Programme Associate, RAHA)
Photos: Huma Akram/RAHA Staff

Printed in September 2013 by PrintMatic, Islamabad

Cover and Layout Design: PrintMatic, Islamabad
The members of women's community organisation 'Shama Tanzeem' raise their hands to show their support for a decision
(Village Padhana, Union Council Dheenda, District Haripur).
 02
The communities themselves monitor these
projects through project and audit committees
composed of members from within them. The
direct implementation and participatory
monitoring makes the projects cost-effective,
while the monitoring by government line
departments and RAHA field engineers takes
care of any technical hurdles.
At the next level, the community organisations
cluster into village organisations that prepare
village development plans and execute large
community physical infrastructure projects. A
village organisation comprises at least 70% of
the community organisations in the village. Until
August 2013, about 75 village organisations
have been formed and the vast majority of them
“I thank Allah for bringing RAHA to us. It helped us during the worst times of our lives,” says 75-year old Syed Marjan, an active
member of women's community organisation 'Roshan Kal' (Union Council Mera Akora Khattak, District Nowshera).
have developed their respective village
development plans.
The formation of the first local support
organisation under RAHA, the last tier of the
programme’s social mobilisation methodology
catering to the whole union council and
comprising at least 70% of the village
organisations there, is on the cards.
Fostering Change: Empowering communities
for inclusive and sustainable change, the
document in your hands, is a humble attempt to
capture the essence of RAHA's exclusive social
mobilisation methodology; to document how
successful the approach has been in promoting
the programme's core values.
Introduction
T he Refugee Affected and Hosting Areas
Programme (RAHA) is an area-based
intervention aimed at uplift of the areas that have
been affected by the presence of Afghan
refugees over the years. An ‘area-based
approach’ focuses on small, homogenous,
geographically contiguous territories to carry out
development interventions. The size and
borders of these territories do not have to be
formally defined and can change over time. The
advantage of this approach is that the
intervention is tailored to local conditions, taking
into account and, therefore, addressing both
local strengths and weaknesses.
The areas where the refugees still reside are
known as 'Refugee Hosting Areas'; while the
ones from where the majority of refugees have
left or repatriated back to Afghanistan, but their
pressure on resources is still being felt, as
'Refugee Affected Areas'. RAHA works in both
refugee hosting and refugee affected areas.
The effects of the presence of Afghan refugees
in an area are obvious: resources come under
pressure as they are made to sustain a much
greater population than originally intended.
These effects range from burden on health,
education, water and sanitation services to
physical infrastructure of the area and even the
surrounding environment.
The pressure on resources is not restricted only
to the areas hosting the refugees; the
surrounding areas are often affected too, as the
hosting areas either divert more resources from
there or as local populations move there in
search of work. The effects of increased
pollution, reduced water supply, deforestation
and even greater criminal activity are also felt by
the surrounding areas.
RAHA, adopting a bottom-up approach, takes
the union council as its overall area of
intervention. The programme's first area of
intervention is at the level of a mohallah or street,
03
having approximately 30 households or a
population of about 200. This intervention is built
up to the level of a village, having a population of
about 10,000-20,000. These villages are then
organised at the level of a union council, having
a population of about 50,000-100,000.
The participants of the Leadership Management Skills Training workshop
learn new concepts (Union Council Ziarat Balanosh, District Chagai).
RAHA's area of intervention is pre-defined and it
intervenes in specific refugee affected and/or
hosting union councils. However, these may
change with circumstances; for example, when
refugees, including IDPs, move to a different
union council.
Within these areas, RAHA has a pre-defined
methodology for intervention. The basic
premise behind this methodology is that only
highly capacitated communities can develop
and sustain the area they reside in. Therefore,
RAHA's whole intervention is based on
organisation and capacity building of local
communities.
Two factors are extremely important to
understanding RAHA's strength as a holistic
programme: 1) it attempts to develop the whole
area that has been adversely affected by
refugees; and 2) it uses area-based approach to
train the local communities for developing and
sustaining their surrounding areas.
Refugee Affected and Hosting Areas Programme (RAHA)

Basri Jan makes a point during a meeting held to review progress of the project (Union Council Mera Akora Khattak, District Nowshera).
Social Mobilisation:
An Outline
R AHA follows the standard social
mobilisation methodology being currently
used by various social development actors. This
three-tier methodology begins with the formation
of community organisations that consolidate
households into an organisation. An attempt is
made to organise 70% of the households
making up a neighbourhood into a community
organisation. This normally leads to formation of
a community organisation comprising 20 to 25
households, thus more than one community
organisations are formed in a target village.
After these community organisations undergo a
certain level of capacity building, they are
consolidated into a village organisation that
includes representatives from each one of them.
The attempt is, once again, to cover 70% of the
households in the village. The function of a
05
village organisation is to meet the prioritised
needs of the whole village. To guide this
intervention, a 'village development plan' is
prepared and implemented.
A village development plan is prepared by the
village organisation during the village
development planning session. A situation
analysis is conducted using a participatory
approach. The participants then make a
decision on where they would like the village to
be in five years' time. Then, they decide the
interventions required to attain their targets and
prioritise these interventions using a standard
tool, called the 'pair-wise ranking'.
The last tier in the RAHA social mobilisation
strategy is that of local support organisation,
which covers the whole union council and is a
Refugee Affected and Hosting Areas Programme (RAHA)
 06
consolidation of all the village organisations in
the area. Representatives from each village
organisation join the local support organisation
and this ensures that 70% of the households in
the union council are covered.
A local support organisation not only focuses on
a much larger area than a village organisation,
but also unites village organisations in the area.
The local support organisations also build the
capacity of the village organisations, by directly
conducting trainings or involving them in higher-
level intervention projects. They assist in
resolving conflicts within these organisations, if
these arise, and enhancing their vision from a
parochial to a much more universal level.
A village development plan prioritises community needs for the next five years.
The most important function of a local support
organisation is to provide a much bigger and
united platform for the communities' interaction
with the government and donors. They plan and
implement various project interventions, for
which they obtain funds from both the
government and donors.
In essence, the local support organisations
behave as independent development actors
that are able to guide and nurture other, less
experienced organisations. Their biggest
advantage is that they remain local actors,
ensuring that their interventions continue to be
informed by local expertise and responsive to
the local realities.
RAHA Social Mobilisation
Methodology
T
he description above provides the bare
backbones of the standard social
mobilisation methodology. RAHA, however,
uses this methodology for a very specific reason:
to train communities to restore and maintain the
area that they inhabit. Due to this reason,
RAHA's implementation of the methodology is
flexible and highly responsive to the situation on
the ground.
RAHA, in essence, starts the social mobilisation
process by conducting a meeting with the
stakeholders of target area. The stakeholders
include government officials and notables of the
relevant area. RAHA apprises them of its
mandate and requests their assistance in
accessing the local population. This allows
RAHA to easily access the local population,
without creating unnecessary suspicions or
resentments. The risk in the strategy, however,
is undue influence by the notables.
RAHA then uses this introduction to arrange a
meeting with the local inhabitants where it
provides them with an overview of the
programme and encourages them to join its
efforts by forming a community organisation as a
first step. This meeting is termed the 'first
dialogue'. At least three dialogues are conducted
before the community organisation is formed,
based on the membership of local actors. The
purpose of these dialogues is to ensure that only
committed people become part of the
community organisation.
The areas where RAHA is intervening naturally
have Afghan refugees in residence. The level of
integration of the Afghan and Pakistani societies
varies. In some places, the Afghans and
Pakistanis live as neighbours and interact with
one another, even marrying into each other's
communities. In other places, they live parallel
07
lives, inhabiting neighbouring areas but not
interacting with each other.
RAHA's methodology of creating a community
organisation ensures that the Afghan
households in the area are also included in the
community organisation. This naturally
facilitates dialogue and cooperation between
the Afghan and Pakistani communities.
Conflicts arising over land or agriculture are
easily resolved in this set up and Afghans are
valued members of these organisations.
The only hurdle faced by the Afghans is that the
Pakistani government does not provide them
with computerised national identity cards
(CNICs). This means that they cannot become
the president or manager of the community
organisation because they cannot be
signatories for bank accounts.
Once the community organisation is formed, it
selects or elects a president and a manager.
These elections are limited to the community
members who have CNICs. A bank account for
the community organisation is opened in the
name of these office-bearers who then take
over the responsibility for all monetary
transactions.
Members and office-bearers of the community
organisation are imparted capacity building
trainings on important topics such as
sustainable development, participatory
development, record keeping, leadership
management, peace and conflict resolution.
These training events equip them to deal with
issues of peace building and participatory
needs assessment.
The community organisation then identifies the
poorest inhabitants of the area using local
RefugeeAffected
Refugee Affected and
and Hosting
Hosting Areas
Areas Programme
Programme(RAHA)
(RAHA)
 08
A RAHA social organiser helps the members of newly-formed men's community organisation 'Insaf' to conduct constraint analysis
exercise (Union Council Roghani-I, District Killa Abdullah).
Sana participates in the 3-day Community Management Skills Training workshop for office-bearers of 12 women's community
organisations (Union Council Panam Dheri, District Peshawar).
knowledge and a system of classification
created by the community itself. The
classification system varies among different
community organisations, but generally includes
indicators such as households where the main
wage earner is unemployed or a female,
households with a disabled member,
households without property or assets, etc.
This methodology was adopted when
community members suggested a greater
number of beneficiaries than the ones listed in
the Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP)
ranking of the poorest households. This is
probably reflective of natural disasters and a
shrinking economy. The system of identifying
every poor through poverty card ranking –
adopted by certain other organisations – was
very difficult for community members to
understand and use, especially when it came to
women's community organisations, mainly
because of very low levels of literacy.
Next, the community organisation carries out a
needs prioritisation exercise. This requires the
members to identify their needs, categorise
09
them by priority and then decide on which needs
to address first. The decision of the need to be
addressed is formally put forth in a resolution.
The needs prioritisation exercise is often
accompanied by a corresponding resource
identification exercise enabling the community
to identify potential ways and means to address
the identified need. The 'pair-wise ranking' tool is
used to guide the needs identification exercise.
Once again, this tool is deployed in accordance
with the situation on the ground. Often, the social
mobilisation teams may decide to simply carry
out a discussion, listing the various needs
identified and voting on the relevant need to
identify the highest priority.
Since the needs identification exercise is only a
step in the capacity building of the community
organisation, it is important that the concept of
joint identification and decision of needs be
absorbed by its members and confusion that
might arise by using advanced methodologies
are avoided by the social mobilisation teams in
certain situations. These exercises ensure that
Refugee Affected and Hosting Areas Programme (RAHA)
 10 11

the most pressing needs are addressed and the
most deprived beneficiaries are catered to, thus
the risk of being influenced by the notables,
created by the stakeholder meeting, is
addressed.
Another method of validating the intervention
undertaken is to use 'baselines' to guide it.
Baselines are indicators of the situation on the
ground at the beginning of the intervention.
RAHA has just finished compiling union council
profiles that give a detailed picture of each target
union council under the programme.
The union council profiles include information on
population, health, education, water and energy
supply, employment sectors and their status,
standards of living, and various other indicators
relevant to development sector interventions.
These professionally created profiles provide an
objective manner of validating the community
organisations' analyses of their situation, as well
as measuring the effect of the intervention that is
undertaken.
The 'pair-wise ranking' tool lists the needs
identified in a matrix, with the same needs
appearing in both rows and columns. Each
column heading is compared with every
row heading below it. The heading given
precedence is written in the intersecting
box they share. At the end of the exercise,
the number of times a heading appears is
counted up. The heading with the highest
number is the one with the highest rank.
This process ensures a continuous, close and
interdependent relationship between the
government and community organisations,
facilitating the latter in learning how to access
and interact with government personnel; while
simultaneously providing the government
personnel with the relevant capacities and tools
to meet the needs of the community
organisations.
enough to join together in the form of a village
organisation, which then repeats this process at
a higher level: instead of identifying the poorest
in a neighbourhood and prioritising the needs at
a household level, the village organisation
addresses the needs of a whole village.
A measure of the rigour of RAHA's interventions
with community organisations is reflected in that
only a few village organisations have so far been
created under the programme. Also, RAHA's
village organisations have not yet graduated to
form local support organisations, though
sufficient village organisations are likely to
mature enough to form a few local support
organisations by the end of this year.
Importantly, RAHA acknowledges that often
community organisations created by other
development actors in the field already exist in
The president of men's community organisation 'Medwa' addresses the members during a meeting held to discuss the release of
second instalment of funds for the construction of an amusement park for children and families (District Swabi).
its area of intervention. Therefore, instead of re-
inventing the wheel, RAHA 'adopts' the existing
community or village organisations for the sake
of enhancing their interventions and creating a
sustained development effort in the area.
Community and village organisations created by
SRSP, Qatar Charity, FAO, PIDS, BRSP and
WESS have so far been adopted by RAHA.
Often, these organisations have been formed
for a specific purpose; an NGO may be
intervening in an area for a specific purpose. For
example, the organisation may have been
formed to address only sanitation or only
education needs. This, obviously, limits the
scope of its intervention as well as its vision.
Adoption by RAHA is crucial to expanding the
vision and scope of the organisation in question,
making it a truly area-based development actor
instead of a sector-based one.

The link of the community organisations with the

government remains very close, even at the
needs prioritisation level. Further assessment of
certain priority needs is jointly carried out with the
government; for example, those of major
physical infrastructure or social services such as
education, health, water supply, etc.
Since the government is the major actor fulfilling
these needs, the assessment of needs in these
areas obviously requires its input. The same is
also true for solution to these needs.
Interventions made directly with the government
include the building of roads, renovation of public
schools, execution of water and sanitation
schemes, and strengthening of government
employment information centres.
Certain other needs, once prioritised, are then
addressed in cooperation with the government.
For example, trainings provided for improving
the capacity of the community in the agriculture
sector are often provided by the staff of the
Department of Agriculture Extension.
The community organisation itself is responsible
for the implementation of every aspect of an
intervention. It plans the intervention, hires the
relevant staff and oversees the implementation.
The budget required is transferred into the
community organisation's bank account by
RAHA and the former is responsible for handling
all monetary disbursements. At-least two people
per community organisation take this
responsibility to maintain transparency.
Each step of the process is recorded, thus the
community organisations become skilled at
maintaining clear and detailed records. An
operations and maintenance committee is part
of the community organisation overseeing the
implementation. Both the record keeping and
the operations and maintenance committees
assist in creating a transparent system with clear
lines of responsibility.
Once the community organisations have gone
through this system, they are considered mature

Refugee Affected and Hosting Areas Programme (RAHA)

 12 13

RAHA's Intervention
Methodology:
An Analysis
T he above description clearly shows how the RAHA
social mobilisation methodology brings a completely
new attitude to the table. RAHA's intervention
methodology has some distinguishing characteristics
setting it apart from other social mobilisation interventions.
These have been summarized in the following:

1. RAHA interventions have only one guiding

principle: area-based development. Therefore,
any need prioritised by the community can be met
under the programme. There are no restrictions.
This characteristic is not true for all actors in the
field. Often the development actor may be
intervening for a specific purpose; for example, to
improve water and sanitation conditions or restore
physical infrastructure. The needs put forth by the
community organisations created by these
development actors are thus restricted in the type
of intervention they can carry out. This, obviously,
restricts their impact in the area and the success of
their intervention.

2. RAHA interventions are driven by the community

organisations who decide both the need to
address and how to address it. The community
organisations working with other development
actors often have a pre-defined agenda or need to
address; for example, water and sanitation or
restoration of physical infrastructure. Thus, RAHA
community organisations undergo a much more
rigorous practical training helping them to become
independent and enabling them to successfully
design and implement their interventions.

3. RAHA community organisations carry out the

implementation and monitoring of every project
intervention by themselves. They use local labour
and complement RAHA's funds using private
contributions. The community organisations
working with other development sector actors
often outsource project implementation, focusing
Training facilitator Fauzia explains different concepts of development to the participants of the 3-day Community Management
only on the monitoring aspect.
Skills Training workshop for office-bearers of 12 women's community organisations (Union Council Panam Dheri, District
Peshawar.

Refugee Affected and Hosting Areas Programme (RAHA)

 14 15

The members of men's village organisation 'Sakezai' evolve consensus during discussion on the need for a pipeline (Village
Dadagzai, Union Council Khanozai, District Pishin).

Characteristics of
RAHA Interventions:
1. Flexible and Responsive: RAHA interventions are based on the needs on the
ground and are not limited by a standard design. Though the standard
methodology is present as a guide, its application at each level is determined by
how appropriate it is for the target audience.

2. Strong Linkages with the Government: RAHA interventions involve government

personnel at every stage. The government is involved from the beginning of the
social mobilisation intervention. It is part of the stakeholders' meeting that takes
place before the area is accessed and it is included in the needs prioritisation,
implementation and monitoring activities. The overall project is overseen by three
government committees: a Federal Task Force, a Provincial Task Force and a
District Coordination Committee. These three committees regularly meet to
deliberate on the management and coordination of project activities, as well as
monitor the periodic delivery of the project. Thus, the project has full ownership of
the government, which enhances its prospects of remaining sustainable. When
the project pulls out of an area, the government can easily and willingly take over
responsibility for it.

3. Guided by Needs of Area-Based Development: RAHA interventions allow the

community to prioritise any need that will develop the local area. It is not limited by
the requirement of one sector of intervention only; for example, health or
4. RAHA community organisations are closely linked with the government, which is involved in education.
each stage of project implementation, from the formation of the community organisations to
the needs analysis exercise to project implementation and monitoring. As a result, RAHA
projects have a very high likelihood of remaining sustainable. This, once again, is not true of
all other development sector actors in the field. Members of women's
community organisation
'Mohallah Kausar Masjid' meet
5. RAHA actively seeks partnerships with all other development actors in its area of
to set milestones for an
intervention. To this end, it willingly adopts community organisations that have been set up upcoming project to
by other development actors. Some of these organisations may now be inactive. RAHA not rehabilitate a park for women
only re-activates them, but also tries to address the reasons these organisations became and children (Union Council
Panian, District Haripur).
inactive to ensure future sustainability. This is a major strength of the RAHA methodology
and it differentiates the programme from probably every other social mobilisation
intervention.

6. The RAHA methodology of intervention, as discussed in points 2 and 3 above, promotes

critical thinking among the members of its community organisations. This is an achievement
prohibited by the more didactic methodologies of other development sector actors.

Refugee Affected and Hosting Areas Programme (RAHA)

16

4. Cost Effective: RAHA uses the implementation of each intervention as an opportunity of

Raha Districts
training and capacity building for the community organisation. This ensures that benefits are
simultaneously disbursed; the community organisation builds its capacities as the area
develops.
C
H
5. Promotes Social Cohesion: The close cooperation with the government and the community I
N
in the relevant area ensures social cohesion as all stakeholders move towards the same A
Khyber
objective.
Pakhtunkhwa
6. Pragmatic: RAHA does not hesitate to collaborate with other actors in the area, easily LOWER DIR

adopting their organisations. N BUNER

A
T HARIPUR
7. Fostering Critical Thinking Skills: The very act of creating plans from a low to a high level I
S PESHAWAR
ISLAMABAD
enables the government and communities to develop their critical thinking and planning N SWABI
A
skills. These are crucial to sustainable development in any area. Thus, RAHA interventions H
G NOWSHERA
have a very high level of sustainability built into them. F
A
KILLA
SAIFULLAH
Killa Abdullah

PISHIN PUNJAB
LORALAI
QUETTA

CHAGAI

BALOCHISTAN
I R A N

SINDH

Balochistan Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

Chagai Buner
Killa Abdullah Haripur

Killa Saifullah Lower Dir

Loralai Nowshera
Pishin Peshawar
Quetta Swabi
With funding by the European Union

Refugee Affected and Hosting Areas Programme (RAHA)

United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)
6th Floor, Serena Business Complex, Khayban-e-Suharwardy, Islamabad.
URL: www.undp.org.pk