From Isaac Akwetey-Okunor
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The Suhum Municipality has been adjudged Best Municipality under the Strengthening Transnational Partnership and network for enhancing Participatory Local Governance Project (STRAP).
This was after the municipality scored 89%, the highest among all the 15 participatory Local Authorities from the three countries, under Transparency and Accountability, at the last regional workshop in Gambia. Notwithstanding the 89 percent score in transparency and accountability, the Local Authority, however, recorded the least mark of 6.6% under Equity.
Throwing light on the functions of STRAP at a press briefing, which was followed with a workshop for members, the host of the workshop and also the Municipal Chief Executive for Suhum, Samuel Fleischer-Kwabi, unveiled that the STRAP Programme involves 15 authorities from Ghana, Gambia and Zimbabwe, with a representation of five from each country.
According to him, the participating local authorities in Ghana include Adenta Municipal Assembly in the Greater Accra Region, Suhum Municipal Assembly in the Eastern Region, Gomoa West District Assembly in the Central Region, Atetubu Amatin District Assembly in the Brong Ahafo Region, and Nadowli-Kaleo District Assembly in the Upper West Region.
He said the Urban Council Association of Zimbabwe (UCAZ), which is the lead partner in the STRAP programme, in collaboration with the National Association of Local Authority of Ghana (NALAG) and Gambia Association of Local Association (GALGA) initiated the STRAP programme and awarded a grant in 2010 by the European Union.
Mr. Kwabi averred that the programme was initially expected to run from 2011-2013, but some technical challenges affected the completion schedule, hence the reason why we are still here today, implementing some activities in the programme.
The overall objective of the programme is to support trans-national exchange of lessons and good practices among local government associations and local authorities for enhanced Municipal Service Delivery. One of the key components of the STRAP Programme is the conducting of International Peer Reviews (IPR), which involves assessing the local authorities based on five broad indices of that were agreed at the regional workshop in The Gambia, from 2nd-8th July 2013.
The broad indices include Quality Service Delivery, Transparency and Accountability, Participatory Governance, Gender and Equity. The Municipality of Gwanda in Zimbabwe, however, chose to partner Suhum Municipal Assembly in the International Peer Review (IPR) because of the similarities in the socio economic indicators between the two local authorities.
The Suhum Municipal Assembly was under the same programme organised the Urban Governance Index (UGI) workshop from 3-4th June 2013, which involved the use of a scientific tool to assess the performance of the assembly, based on four thematic areas.
The areas are Effectiveness, Transparency and Accountability, Participatory Governance and Equity.
The Suhum MCE has, therefore, vowed to work assiduously to improve on the performance under Equity, through supporting all the female candidates contesting the impending district level elections. Mr. Kwabi hinted that the IPR process is largely a qualitative assessment based on perceptions of broad stakeholders on key indicators of good governance, as well as relying on documentations with factual information and statistical data.
“However, the interpretation of the outcome is underpinned on qualitative data emanating from interviews with various stakeholders,” he mentioned. He disclosed that IPR in local governance are carried out in the spirit of knowledge sharing among peers seeking to learn from the experiences of their counterparts, hence the assessment to be carried out by the Municipality of Gwanda would not be ends in themselves, but the beginning of learning and a change process aimed at improving service delivery in the respective local authorities.
He added: “If everything goes as planned, we will embark on a reciprocal visit to the Municipality of Gwanda in Zimbabwe, from 27th June-3rd July 2015, to conduct a similar peer review to deepen understanding and consolidate learning”. The most refreshing aspect of the entire STRAP Programme is the sponsorship of participating local authorities to implement joint public projects in partner countries, aimed at enhancing municipal service delivery.