access to Sikika’s key target audience (the MoHSW) and enabled them to present their arguments in their own words. As it turned out, the timing proved to be perfect for influencing the subsequent year’s Budget Guidelines. It is important to select the target audi­ences for an advocacy message carefully; it is also important to think about how to frame the message. Audiences such as the Technical Working Group or partici­pants in the Health Sector Review would have a high level of knowledge about the health sector, policy and financing. As a result, it would likely be feasible and useful to present figures about funds directed to “wasteful expenditures” and how those funds might be better spent. These same audiences should be able to understand technical discussions about law and treaty obligations. It would thus be feasible to point to the government’s legal obligations under article 2. Strategy 2: Advocacy with indirect decision-makers Sikika’s analysis of “unnecessary expenditures” in the budget proposal for 2009-10 pointed to the fact that the Prime Minister’s directives and the Budget Guide­ lines were being followed only selectively. After tar­geting these findings to the Ministry of Finance and the MoHSW without positive responses, Sikika de­cided to direct its advocacy efforts towards Members of Parliament (MPs) serving on the Social Services Committee. By targeting that Committee—key play­ers in the area of government accountability—Sikika hoped to strengthen its role in oversight and budget planning. Legislators are part of government, and as such, have human rights obligations. Informing legislators and legislative committee members about issues and about their roles in oversight and budget decisions should include information about the government’s human rights obligations, the place of the budget in fulfilling those obligations, and what legislators should do to ensure that the government is meeting its human rights obligations. Strategy 3: Media outreach After reaching out to Parliament, Sikika decided to engage with the public via a media strategy to publicize its findings broadly and keep the issue alive. Media coverage was universally positive, and unnecessary expenditures have become an unavoidable topic of discussion whenever the budget is tabled. Now, when the government falls short in enforcing its own directives, the organization has been able to use the media to denounce its shortcomings—thereby keeping the issue in the public’s eye. While ICESCR article 2 obli­gates governments to pro­gressively achieve realiza­tion of the right to health (using the maximum of available resources), an increase in expenditures by a Ministry of Health may not, in itself, translate into increased realization of that right. Similarly, a decrease in unnecessary or wasteful expenditures would not, in itself, guaran­tee that additional funds are being spent in a way that effectively realizes people’s right to health. In other words, increases and decreases in funding for essential services are important pieces of evi­dence as to a government’s compliance with its article 2 obligations. More conclu­sive evidence, however, would have to be derived from trends in statistics related to mortality, morbidity, disease, etc.