Consultancy for an independent evaluation -OMCT عودة إلى الفرص

World Organization Against Torture (OMCT)

Consultancy for an independent evaluation 

Empowering the INPT to advance the prevention of torture in Tunisia

September 2022

Table of Contents

1. Organizational and Project Background 2
2. Scope and Purpose of the evaluation 3
3. Evaluation criteria and questions 3
4. Methodology 5
5. Deliverables 5
6. Timeline 6
7. Logistical Support 6
8. Requirements of Consultant 7
9. Selection Criteria 7
10. Applications 7

1. Organizational and project background

World Organization Against Torture

The World Organization Against Torture (Organisation Mondiale Contre la Torture – OMCT) is a non-profit organization working through its large and active SOS-Torture Network. It’s among the largest civil society coalitions fighting torture and all other forms of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment in the world. The mission of the OMCT is to contribute to the eradication of torture, summary executions, disappearances, arbitrary detention and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment and to provide protection to victims and potential victims through a global network of civil society organisations working in partnership and solidarity. 

The OMCT headquarters are in Geneva, with offices in Brussels and Tunisia. In September 2011, OMCT launched an office in Tunisia to foster a close relationship with its local partners and to support them in their democratic transition. 

The project 

“Empowering the INPT to advance the prevention of torture in Tunisia” is a five-year project funded by DRL and implemented by the OMCT. The overall objective of this project is to support the National Authority for the Prevention of Torture (INPT) in fulfilling its mandate to address and prevent torture throughout Tunisia. This goal will be achieved through the following specific objectives and outcomes. 

Specific Objective 1. Building capacity and expertise of the INPT 

• Specific Outcome 1: A functional and working INPT 

By the end of the project, the INPT has achieved full functioning in all areas of its mandate, is the center for expertise on monitoring places of detention, legislative and factual issues related to torture and ill treatment in Tunisia, and has begun and engaged in systematic and regular monitoring visits, reporting, and capacity-building efforts which are achieving demonstrable gains toward prevention of torture in Tunisia.

Specific Objective 2. Empowering local structures and CSOs to work with and inform the INPT

• Specific Outcome 2: Stakeholders’ acceptance, support and recognition of the role of the INPT, including by signaling allegations of torture and by gaining visible public support

By the end of the project, national NGOs from all over the country have engaged in specific anti-torture activities, initiatives, and campaigns in a coordinated manner, have documented and reported on cases of torture, and have achieved significant media visibility in Tunisia highlighting the plight of those most vulnerable to torture in Tunisia, thereby beginning the long road to justice for victims, and moving public opinion toward greater support for prevention and prohibition against torture.

Specific Objective 3. Ensuring sustainability and increased impact of the INPT and relevant stakeholders, by boosting the Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) engagement throughout the project

• Specific Outcome 3: Empowered institutions and stakeholders better assessing and coordinating work against torture in Tunisia.

By the end of the project, WOAT staff capacities in term of development and management of the project (including in term of digital management) have been increased, in an inclusive process with the INPT and the relevant stakeholders, leading to positive outcomes and impacts for the fight and the prevention of torture in Tunisia.

Those objectives will be achieved through workshops, training, coaching, accompaniment and exchange.

2. Scope and purpose of the evaluation

The OMCT is seeking an external consultant to conduct an endline study to evaluate how the project contributed to support the INPT in fulfilling its mandate to address and prevent torture throughout Tunisia.

The overall goal of this final evaluation is to assess the program’s strategic, design, efficiency, effectiveness and impact over the period of five-year.

The intended objectives of the evaluation are to:

1. Evaluate the project’s performance in terms of achieving its objectives and expected results, and whether the assumptions it made about change were validated;
2. Reflect on how the project activities have directly contributed to the outcomes and what drivers and barriers have affected the achievement of the results/outcomes;
3. Capture good practices, compile lessons learned throughout the lifespan of the project, and draw specific recommendations to inform future program design in a similar context.;
4. Evaluate the sustainability and impact of the project on target stakeholders and beneficiaries.

The evaluation should be based on the OECD-DAC Evaluation Criteria (relevance, effectiveness, impact, efficiency and sustainability), investigating specific lines of inquiry, and utilizing and/or addressing the performance indicators described in the project document.

In addition to the proposed conventional approach of the evaluation, the evaluation is expected to integrate and apply ‘Outcome Harvesting’ techniques to identify the most significant results and the project’s contributions to these changes. The level of integration should be defined clearly in the proposed methodological approach of the consultant technical proposal.

3. Evaluation criteria and questions

More specifically, the endline evaluation will aim to answer the following questions: 

Relevance

• To what extent was the project appropriate and consistent with national government policy and strategy on addressing the prevention of torture and ill treatment? Did relevance continue throughout implementation?
• Are the stated goals and objectives relevant to respond to issues and problems central to the institutionalization of efforts in addressing torture and ill treatment despite the changes that had occurred throughout the project? 
• To what extent did the project approach and design suit the priorities and needs of the diverse stakeholders and actors involved in efforts to prevent torture and ill treatment? 
• Should the direction of the project be changed to better reflect the needs of the different stakeholders? 
• To what extent did the project identify appropriate target populations and partners that best matched the project objectives? 

Effectiveness

• To what extent has the intervention been effective in meeting the essence of the Theory of Change and achieving its results and planned outcomes?
• To what extent was the project design effective and impact oriented? 
• What could have been done differently to make the project be of higher quality, greater impact? 
• Which internal and external factors facilitated or hindered the achievements of expected results/ specific objectives? 
• How did the project contribute to each outcome? What other factors contributed to these changes?

Impact

• To what extent was the project’s approach successful in supporting the INPT in fulfilling its mandate to address and prevent torture throughout Tunisia?
• Were there any unintended or unexpected results (positive or negative)? 
• How was the project, perceived by governmental and non-governmental organizations at the beginning vs. now? Did INPT manage to achieve local and national buy-in? 

Efficiency 

• To what extent have resources been allocated and utilized in an efficient manner to achieve value for money? 
• How efficient was the delivery of the intervention in terms of expenditure and implementation of activities?

Sustainability

• To what extent will the project achievements be sustained? What are the indicators of sustainability for these achievements, e.g., through requisite capacities (strategies, structures, staff, etc.)? What are the challenges and opportunities?
• To what extent are policy and frameworks in place that will support the autonomy and continuation of INPT?

Lessons Learned 

• What were the main challenges faced during the implementation of the activities? How did OMCT and their partners mitigate these?
• How can we capitalize on the achievements of the project in our future similar programs? 

4. Methodology 

The evaluation methodology will be proposed and defined by the consultant, based on OMCT requirements and validation. The OMCT requests that the methodology should employ mixed qualitative and quantitative data collection approaches, as well as triangulation between several methods of data collection. 

This will include, but not be limited to the following approaches: 

• a desk review of the project proposal, project reports and other relevant documentation related to the project;
• the collection of information through key informant interviews, focus group discussions and small scale surveys;
• meetings: site visits, stakeholders meeting, observation; 

Proposals should outline methods for data collection to be used and justification for these methods related to the evaluation questions. Proposals should also include a proposed sampling strategy and approach to analysis, which will be finalized in consultation with the OMCT. These figures will take into consideration the activities carried out by the OMCT and the INPT and the target population. Data collection, analysis, and the results should represent inclusiveness and include a wide range of viewpoints.

The Endline Study will be led by the external consultant under the technical supervision of the OMCT MEL Specialist and the OMCT Head of Office. The OMCT will validate and approve the final methodology and tools before data collection begins, as well as provide feedback on the report. 

5. Deliverables 

The expected evaluation deliverables are as follow:

1. Inception report, which clearly defines the evaluation matrix and methodology. The evaluation matrix should outline what is being evaluated and why, showing how each evaluation question will be answered by way of: proposed methods; proposed sources of data; and data collection procedures. The methodology should include clear outlines for the data collection tools and research timeline with specific deadlines for each deliverable. The Inception report and the data collection tools need formal approval from OMCT before starting the data collection in the field. 
2. Fieldwork report provided within 5 working days after the end of the data collection phase. The report will describe how the fieldwork went off and what challenges were faced.
3. Draft evaluation report to be submitted within two weeks of completion of the data for the review and comments from the OMCT Team. The review and feedback of the report could be more than one round depending on the quality of the report submitted by the consultant and the extent to which the comments and suggestions from the first round of review have been incorporated.
4. Final evaluation report, after incorporating the comments from the OMCT on the draft evaluation report. The report should be written in English language and should be a maximum of 40 pages (excluding annexes) in length.

It should be submitted electronically in MS-Word version and should consists of:

• Cover Page;
• Table of contents, list of acronyms/abbreviations and list of tables and charts;
• Executive summary of key findings and recommendations;
• Introduction including context analysis, and evolution in context since project launch;
• Evaluation methodology;
• Evaluation findings, analysis, and conclusions with associated data presented per evaluation criteria. The findings can include subsections for each evaluation criteria.
• Lessons learned and recommendations should be framed according to each evaluation criteria. Recommendations should have a clear audience and be specific and actionable
• Appendices, which include ToRs, data collection tools and the evaluator brief biography.

All original data should be submitted to the OMCT. 

6. Timeline

The total number of working days for the final evaluation will be 40 working days spread over the 65 days period from the date of signing the contract. The evaluation timeline is expected to be kicked off October 17, 2022 and concluded on December 20, 2022 by submitting the final deliverables requested above.  

All deliverables should be delivered within the agreed timeline, nevertheless, the partnership will only be concluded upon successful submission of all deliverables outlined in the table below.

7. Logistical support

The consultant will be responsible for organizing his own logistics for data collection (vehicles, fuel, etc…), and this must be budgeted into the study.

8. Requirements of consultant 

Qualifications: The consultant must have at least a master’s degree in a relevant discipline (political science, Law, human rights, or any related sciences). 

Skills and experience: 

The following skills and experience are expected by the OMCT for our team leader for this project: 

• Excellent proficiency in English and Arabic – written (including professional English reporting);
• More than five years of experience in leading project evaluation, including developing tools, field management (data collection in interviews, surveys and focus groups), and analysis;
• Experience in conducting evaluations for human rights and anti-torture programs;
• Experience working on human rights issues;
• Experience working with victims of human rights violations would be an asset;
• Demonstrable knowledge of the architecture of human rights organizations in Tunisia;
• Experience working with international human rights organizations.

9. Selection criteria 

The consultant’s proposal will be selected for: 

1. Relevance of proposed methodology to the goal, objectives, and evaluation questions. 
2. Quality of proposed data collection methods, analysis approaches, and quality control measures.
3. Qualifications of the candidate. 
4. The proposed budget in relation to the proposed methodology and deliverables 
5. Timeline and evaluation phases for proposed activities. 

ToR-Evaluation-INPT