Lumanti Support Group for Shelter in partnership with EWDE/DKH and Ward no 13 Godavari Municipality conducted the social audit of its Reconstruction and Recovery project on 21 February 2018. The program was organized to share the accomplishments of the project, its activities, achievements, challenges and lessons learnt with the various stakeholders in the municipality and the district.  The financial aspect of the project was also shared in order to maintain the transparency and accountability of the project, which was implemented after the 2015 earthquake. 

Chief Guest Gajendra Maharjan, Mayor of Godavari Municipality appreciated the activities conducted under the project by Lumanti. He praised team effort done with the coordination with stakeholders, government officials and beneficiaries during reconstruction. He also requested LUMANTI to continue working in Godavari Municipality through livelihood improvement projects in future.

Tek Raj Panthi, Executive Officer of Godavari Municipality gave a clear explanation about the government the procedure to the release of grant installment for the affected families. He requested all the beneficiaries to get building permit from municipality so that they are eligible for other possible support to be provided by the government in future. He encouraged all the beneficiaries to share if anything related on reconstruction activities implemented by LUMANTI in Godavari Municipality is not clear to them. He thanked DKH, Lumanti for their effort and team work.

Goma Devi Dhakal, Chief of NRA Lalitpur district thanked Lumanti for supporting government reconstruction process in different districts including Lalitpur district. Besides reconstruction, the program on WASH and DRR is the positive support to the communities affected by the earthquake. Adopting the material distribution forming reconstruction committee with technical support from Lumanti leads to the timely reconstruction for the beneficiaries."  

Similarly, Yamnath Giri, Monitoring and Evaluation Officer, DLPIU/EHRRP thanked and congratulated for the successful completion of the project. He clearly stated that the beneficiaries would either NRS. 300,000 from government or material support worth same amount which has been provided by Lumanti. He requested Ward chairperson, Municipality and beneficiaries to initiate the building permit process and verified by NRA/DLIPU engineers for the reconstructed house.  

Hector Pradhan, representative of DKH thanked the government of Nepal and stakeholders for actively coordination during the program implementation. He is grateful for the hard work of implementing partner Lumanti and support from government. Though there are many challenges during the project time, the team had shown their dedication in their work. The comments and suggestions provided   by the stakeholders, families, RMCs during the project and the collective learning will be useful while developing new projects by both DKH and LUMANTI.         

Two representatives from community shared their views regarding the project.  On behalf of beneficiaries, Surja Maya Ramtel, Member of Arubot Reconstruction Management Committee thanked for all the support provided by Lumanti. She shared that the families had constructed house as per their financial capacity. Rakesh Nepali, Jhyalungtar Reconstruction Management Committee thanked DKH and Lumanti all efforts on reconstruction and technical support. He said, "Without Lumanti it would had been difficult for us to complete our house. Also, the WASH and DRR activities are really useful for the community."

The program was initiated with the welcome remarks from Lajana Manandhar, Executive Director, Lumanti Support Group for Shelter. She shared the challenges faced during the implementation of the project and the strategies which the team had developed to tackle these challenges, opportunities and achievements of the projects. There had to be numerous meetings conducted with the communities, the families, ward office so that the families are motivated to start their houses on time. A lot of negotiations had to be done with the partner organization. She also stressed that the coordination between various stakeholders help to move the project forward and bring in positive changes in the project area. She congratulated the stakeholders, beneficiaries, government officials, Lumanti team for the successfully completing the project within the time. 

Mohan Singh Thapa, Project Coordinator, Lumanti Support Group for Shelter gave a detailed presentation on the project and financial management. The key programmatic highlights, achievements, challenges and learning were presented.  The project started from June 2016 and will be completed in February 2018. The targeted 200 houses are complete till the reporting period, 157 toilets have been constructed and for the rest of the remaining households are repairing their existing ones. In addition to this, 4 water schemes have been repaired and handed over to the water user groups. The women in 5 communities were organized through saving activities; their capacity built and was linked with Thecho Mahila Jagaran activities. The planned DRR activities were also successfully completed as planned. Disaster Management committee was formed and various capacity building trainings for Disaster mitigation, Community Search and rescue, First Aid etc were provided to the community volunteers. Local Disaster Risk Management Plan was prepared for Ward no 3 of the municipality based on the government guideline. He concluded the presentation by stating the fact that the project was successful in delivering the targeted objective to support the most vulnerable group and the material support was an effective way to support these families.

The program concluded with remarks from Chairperson of Ward No. 13 Godavari Municipality Mr. Bhaskar Thapa, who expressed appreciation of the work done by DKH and Lumanti. He congratulated all the beneficiaries for successfully constructing their earth resistant houses. He stated that due process adopted by Lumanti for this reconstruction project, through material distribution in three installment, the houses were constructed quickly. The process could be replicated by the other organizations working in reconstruction and also by the government to support the most vulnerable.  

Various key stakeholders of the project including the community members, Reconstruction management committees, government officials, Mayor of Godavari Municipality, ward officials, DLPIU, EHRP, NRA Lalitpur and stakeholders attended the program.  More than 180 people participated in the program.