On July 14, 2025, MINCODE entered into a Memorandum of Agreement with the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) Regional Office IX. This agreement is for the conduct of Documentation of Open Government Partnership initiatives. These initiatives involve 16 local government units in Region IX (Zamboanga Peninsula).
The Open Government Partnership (OGP) is a global platform for government leaders and civil society advocates. It promotes governance that is transparent, accountable, participatory, and innovative. The Philippines became one of its founding member countries in 2011. Through the issuance of Executive Order No. 31, dated June 20, 2023, the Philippine OGP (PH-OGP) was institutionalized as a multi-stakeholder partnership responsible for overseeing and implementing the country’s commitments to the OGP.
The Philippine Development Plan 2023-2028 provides that the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) will involve more agencies in the national action plan, and mainstream PH-OGP mechanisms at the regional and local levels to ensure sufficient and functional participatory spaces. It also affirms that DILG will continue to implement collaborative practices with civil society organizations (CSOs) in the development, implementation, and monitoring of government programs, and strengthen the capacity of national and local CSOs to engage effectively with government institutions. Accordingly, the DILG-led OGP Localization Program is the institutionalization of fundamental principles of the OGP within the local governance framework. This involves identifying existing local governance processes and structures, and enhancing them through the integration of OGP values – transparency, accountability, citizen participation, and innovation.
Through the OGP Localization Program, the DILG aims to facilitate the documentation of LGU practices aligned with OGP values and principles. To achieve this, the DILG partnered with accredited non-government organizations. In Region IX, the DILG Regional Office IX engaged the services of the Mindanao Coalition of Development NGO Networks (MINCODE) to document OGP practices of LGUs in Zamboanga Peninsula. The Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) was signed between DILG-Region IX and MINCODE on July 14, 2025. A total of sixteen (16) LGUs were selected by DILG-Region IX to participate in the OGP Localization documentation process, based on the Seal of Good Local Governance (SGLG) assessment.
From July 16 to August 15, MINCODE conducted focus group discussions and group interviews in all 16 participating LGUs. The following LGUs participated in this OGP Documentation, namely: Liloy, Gutalac, and Labason in Zamboanga del Norte; Buug, Payao, Mabuhay, Diplahan in Zamboanga Sibugay and Isabela City (Basilan); and Aurora, Bayog, Dumingag, Guipos, Kumalarang, Molave, Tigbao, and Vincenzo A. Sagun in Zamboanga del Sur. A total of 192 government and civil society leaders participated in the OGP documentation process.
Copy of the Full Report is available here.
MINCODE 