Follow The Money, an initiative of Connected Development that tracks national governments’ and foreign assistance spending to enable citizens hold governments accountable to their commitments, has won the United Nations 2019 Sustainable Development Action Awards.
Follow The Money won the Mobilizer award, making Nigeria emerge winner out of 143 countries with over 2000 applications.
Follow The Money had earlier been announced by the SDG Action Award as one of the 3 initiatives in the finalist category of Mobilisers. Other categories are Storytellers, Campaigners, Connectors, Visualizers, Includers and Creatives. The finalists in each category will present their achievements at the UN SDG Global Festival of Action.
Announcing the victory via his twitter account, Chief Executive of Connected Development, Hamzat Lawal, said “follow the money, from Nigeria to the world. Our #SDGAwards is dedicated to all the rural grassroots communities across Africa and my very dedicated Team, partners and supporters from around the world #SDGglobalFest We can achieve #SDGs with you.”
Every year, the UN SDG Action Campaign opens the SDG Action Awards to call for the top individuals, civil society organizations, subnational governments, foundations, networks, private sector leaders who are advancing the global movement for the Sustainable Development Goals in the most transformative, impactful and innovative way.
Follow The Money which started in Nigeria over seven years ago, has chapters in Kenya, The Gambia, Cameroon and Liberia. As the largest social mobilization & accountability movement in Africa, it has advocated, visualized and tracked USD 10 million meant for social development across African grassroots communities, impacting directly over 2,000,000 rural lives.