Abstract:
Community participation (CP) has been recognized as the key principle in health
governance. Yet, knowledge of its effective applicability varied. This paper
assessed the government health actors' knowledge of CP in health governance.
The purpose of the paper was to examine the actors' level of knowledge
concerning the perspectives of CP in health governance. Purposive and
convenient sampling was applied due to the need to meet specific participants
and the many other categories, making reliability certain. A sample of 79 was
engaged, comprising community representatives in health committees at district
and facility levels, health service providers, political actors, and administrators.
Data were collected using semi-structured interviews, focus group discussions,
and documentary reviews. The analysis was executed by theme and content
analysis that employed semantic differentials and weighted mean. It was found
that most community representatives in facility-level health committees had low
knowledge of CP in health governance. This was connected to the low level of
education that these actors have. The paper found various perspectives on CP,
including resource mobilization, use of health services, facilitation of health
services, community representation in health services, and broadness of the
process of CP. It was concluded that most government health actors had a low
level of knowledge regarding CP. This was related to the ineffectiveness of local
health governance and recommended developing a CP policy that defines and
articulates how CP should be understood and practiced in the context of health
services.
