Assessing the Activity and Performance of Community Development Councils in Implementing Local Projects in Bamyan Province, Afghanistan

Abstract

The Afghan people lack access to essential social services, including schools, clinics, water, electricity, and transportation. To solve the aforementioned problems, Community Development Councils (CDCs) have been established in each village; however, after several years, the problems of local people remain unsolved. Therefore, this study examined the level of activity and performance of CDCs in local projects in Bamyan province. This was a quantitative study that used an SRS method to distribute questionnaires to 384 members of the rural community, and descriptive analysis was performed using SPSS. The results show that the performance of Panjab District’s CDCs was 75 percent successful in pre-project implementation activities (needs assessment, prioritization and planning stages); 95.5 percent successful in project implementation activities (project initiation, division of labour, monitoring and control, reporting, evaluation and project closure); and 81.8 percent successful in post-implementation activities (during the use, exploitation and protection of the projects), the people are satisfied and they have achieved the highest percentage among the eight districts of this province. On the other hand, Yakawlang District No.1’s CDCs were not successful with 78.6 percent in pre-project implementation activities, 85.7 percent in project implementation, and 75 percent in post-project implementation activities, and have not achieved the satisfaction of the local people, which shows the lack of success among the districts of Bamyan province. The other six districts fall between these two extremes, demonstrating varying levels of success in CDC performance and corresponding levels of satisfaction among local people.