A Dissertation Submitted to School of Public Administration and Management
for the Partial fulfillment of the Requirement for the Award of Masters of
Science Degree in Health Monitoring and Evaluation of Mzumbe University
The purpose of the study was to evaluate monitoring and evaluation practices and
their effects in district councils. Specific research questions were the extent to which
M&E have been practiced in district councils; the level to which M&E influence
accountability in district councils; the scale to which M&E affect decision making in
district councils; the degree to which M&E affect transparency in district councils;
and the level to which M&E affect organizational learning? A study case design was
used to obtain both qualitative and quantitative data. A purposive sampling used to
sample 60 respondents comprised of district executives’ directors and head of
departments. The study findings showed that to monitoring and evaluation had been
applied in district councils as a management tool for activities, projects or
programme. Monitoring has been conducted through planning departments in their
respective councils; the planning departments are responsible for coordinating,
budgeting and monitoring. The study found that evaluations are rarely conducted in
district councils. Furthermore, it was revealed what was practiced was not
evaluation, it was rather monitoring because it looked on output and not outcome or
impacts of projects or program. Moreover, the councils lacked M&E units, M&E
plans, and M&E specialists and they do not allocate adequately fund required for
monitoring and evaluation activities. As a consequence of this there were no real
systematic M&E practises councils as is conducted randomly. Furthermore, study
showed that monitoring and evaluation had positive effects on accountability,
management decision, transparency, and organizational learning learning as high
effect where by M&E has helped in generating answers on impact and sustainability
of the project or programme by reporting the results of various interventions and
citizens are provided with information on the various activities implemented. M&E
had improved the capacity and knowledge of staff in conducting monitoring and
evaluation in various projects hence lead to organizational performance and
achieving organizational goal in time. It was concuded that that M&E enhances
accountability ,decision making, transparency, and organizational learning.The study
recommended that M&E should be established, insituionalize and training is needed
for staff involved in monitoring and evaluation.