Ghana government's delivery tracker commendable but lacks transparency

We wish to commend the Government of Ghana for its recently launched performance tracker. This innovative initiative will improve access to information on the government’s physical infrastructural development, promote public accountability, and provide a means to measure the government’s performance relative to its political promises.

The tracker which is dubbed “Delivering our Promise” and can be accessed on www.deliverytracker.gov.gh provides data on government infrastructural projects since 2017 with a geographic breakdown of ongoing and completed projects.

CenPOA makes the following observations after a careful review of the performance tracker:

1. The tracker has a very user-friendly interface and provides basic information on ongoing projects being undertaken across the country.

2. The tracker does not provide information on project timelines i.e. project commencement and completion dates; and whether they are new or inherited projects. Without this information, it will be difficult to measure the exclusive efforts and contributions of the current government as the tracker seeks to project.

3. The tracker does not include data on project costs and sources of funding as these will help assess the cost-benefits and value for money for the reported projects.

4. Several related projects have been captured separately, a situation that can lead to data duplication. A school and its associated toilet facilities built at the same time are reported as two separate projects.

5. Some privately funded projects found their way onto the list which should include only government-initiated and/or sponsored projects.

Despite some of the challenging issues enumerated above, we believe that the government performance tracker is a bold initiative by the government to ensure accountability and civic engagement. To improve transparency and maintain the integrity of the tracker, more details must be provided on projects reported whilst the scope of the tracker must be expanded to include all government projects and not just those of a particular regime.

We call on everyone, both government and citizenry, to refrain from politicizing such accountability initiatives to enable them to fully achieve their intended purpose and to help strengthen our democracy.

For more information or to obtain an interview with CenPOA please call 0241185635 or email lakwarteng@cenpoa.org or visit www.cenpoa.org.