Stories from Isaac Akwetey-Okunor
The Deputy Eastern Regional Minister, Mavis Ama Frimpong, has charged assembly and presiding members of the various Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) in the country to sell government projects.
The former District Chief Executive (DCE) for Birim North said the issues of people pouring onto the streets to demonstrate against the government would become thing of the past, if Assembly and Presiding Members “evangelised” what the government was doing to bring socio-economic relief to the people.
She made the call at a day’s national decentralisation advocacy workshop, organised by the Inter-Ministerial Coordinating Committee (IMCC) at Akosombo over the weekend for the Eastern and Volta Zone.
Issues such as introduction to decentralisation policy framework and action plan, status report on the implementation of the new decentralisation policy framework, and action plan and role of assembly and civil society organizations in the implantation of the policy and plan were key among the discussions.
The programme, which was sponsored by the United Nations Development Programme, was under the theme, “Deepening Advocacy for Accelerating Effective Decentralisation and Local Governance in Ghana,” and attended by Prof. Kwamena Ahwoi, the leadership of the IMCC, assembly and presiding members, coordinating directors from the Eastern and Volta regions, as well as civil society organisations.
She continued that despite the fact that Ghanaians had the right to demonstrate to register their displeasure over one thing or the other, demonstrations did not necessary mean one should go onto the streets.
According to her, sitting down with the authorities to brainstorm on how best to find lasting solutions to some challenges should be the best option for members in our various communities, rather than poring onto the streets.
To this end, he urged the assembly and presiding members to take the challenge of educating their electorates on the need to jaw-jaw, than to “war-war” on trivial issues.
This she was convinced that if assembly and presiding members would be ambassadors of their respective institutions by telling their electorates the effort the assemblies and government were putting in place to improve on their conditions, the issue of unnecessary demonstrations would be over.
The Deputy Eastern Regional Minister took opportunity of the programme to express her profound gratitude to Ghanaians for level of political maturity demonstrated throughout the 2012 election petition hearing.
According to her, the selfless effort of Ghanaians, to protect and project the socio-economic and political image of the country during this challenging time, had paid immensely, as it had boosted the confidence of the international bodies in Ghana.
Speaking at the programme, the Executive Secretary of the IMCC, Dr. Callistus Mahama, intimated that the role of local governance in the decentralisation process cannot be under-estimated in Africa, and in Ghana in particular.
According to him, in many Africa countries decentralisation was focused on political and individual leadership, hence building the capacity for local governance was most important to the cause of decentralisation.
He mentioned that the introduction of the decentralisation policy framework and action plan was to improve local governance development in Ghana.