Strengthening accountability and local governance system is our goal - Minister

Mr Kwasi Adjei Boateng, a Deputy Minister for Local Government and Rural Development (MLG&RD), has said Government is committed to strengthening the country’s accountability and local governance system to enhance our development efforts.

He said this could be achieved through accurate and holistic district reports regarding development at the local level which has been of grave concern for some time.

Mr Boateng was addressing participants at a two-day training on Web-Based Reporting and Monitoring and Evaluation Platform develop by the MLG&RD with support from the France-Ghana Corporation.

The event was held under the project: “Strengthening Accountability in Ghana’s Central and Local Government”.

The platform is being deployed on a pilot basis to Works-Engineers, Budget Analyst and Planning Officers of Metropolitan, Municipal and Districts (MMDAs) in the Greater Accra Region and the Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolitan Assemblies.

The training was to educate the participants who would be the main users of the platform on how it works to achieve the purpose for which it has been created.

He said the National Data Monitoring Web-Based Platform would improve district reports and provide accurate and holistic data/information regarding development in the district.

Mr Boateng, who is also the Member of Parliament for New Juaben North in the Eastern Region, said the monitoring and evaluation system is designed to capture, process and analyse data as well as build and review reports from the districts level.

“The platform is also design to aggregate monitoring data on regional basis for consolidation at the national level and have options for querying specific details at all levels to provide multi-level user rights for regional and national actors and have room for future expansion.”

He said a consultant was engaged to carry out stakeholder consultations in selected assemblies purposely for the collection of the necessary of data, establishment of reporting system and the content of the software and its applications for MMDAs use.

The Deputy Minister said the consultant at the national level engaged the Heads of Directorates of the Ministry, the National Development Planning Commission, Office of the Head of the Local Government Service and the Greater Accra and Central Regional Planning Coordinating Units at the regional level to establish their needs for inclusion in the development of the software.

“The consultant at the MMDAs level engaged Tema Metropolitan, Ledzorkuku Krowor Municipal and Ningo Prampam District assemblies. The need of the assemblies which were gathered were harmonized, validated, prioritize and detailed as the requirements of the prioritized needs for the development of the software.

“A ‘Project and programmes Register’ was further developed to provide detailed information on the actual status of implementation of projects and programmes at the MMDAs including funding.”

Dr Marion CHAPON, Cooperation Attache at the French Embassy, said the Government of France was supporting Ghana with a budget of 800,000 euros over a period of three years to execute the project.

She said the main objective of the project was to strengthen the implementation of accountability mechanisms within the Government of Ghana and it is based on three operational components.

Dr CHAPON expressed the hope that the project will reinforce reforms for a more efficient public administration and strengthen good governance which is a value the two countries do share.