Decentralization Is About Hard Work, Doctors!

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• Ghanaman1 11 years ago

  Are they not representing localities?

  Are they not representing localities?

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• JAY 11 years ago

  Agreed. MPs and Doctors represent their localities so why this double standard. Let's level the playing field.

  Agreed. MPs and Doctors represent their localities so why this double standard. Let's level the playing field.

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• Anthony Bambamutia 11 years ago

  This is the only time you, this despicable dog-eating Akyem empty braggart of a failed scholar (poet or journalist?), have made sense to contribute ideas to the public discourse on Ghana's affairs.

  This is the only time you, this despicable dog-eating Akyem empty braggart of a failed scholar (poet or journalist?), have made sense to contribute ideas to the public discourse on Ghana's affairs.

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• Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D. 11 years ago

  Your name does not even sound like it was given you by a sensible parent.

  Your name does not even sound like it was given you by a sensible parent.

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• K. Boateng 11 years ago

  Does ahoofe means it was given to you by sensible parents. Your parents knew you were too ugly and therefore had to qualify your ugliness with Ahoofe in order to make you presentable and acceptable to the public. Not only hav ...
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  Does ahoofe means it was given to you by sensible parents. Your parents knew you were too ugly and therefore had to qualify your ugliness with Ahoofe in order to make you presentable and acceptable to the public. Not only have you proven to be ugly in appearance but you've also proven to be ugly in thought and acts. Kwame Ahootan Okoampa, the akyem dog eating rat.

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• Daniel K. Pryce 11 years ago

  Kwame,
  
  You've raised some important points about this decentralization brouhaha that has left doctors fuming. Sadly, however, such a plan by government is myopic and cannot be enforced.
  
  First, why ask the districts to p ...
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  Kwame,
  
  You've raised some important points about this decentralization brouhaha that has left doctors fuming. Sadly, however, such a plan by government is myopic and cannot be enforced.
  
  First, why ask the districts to pay doctors' salaries when district chief executives are appointed by the president? Should decentralization not begin at the top? It makes no sense to require that a district, which, by law, is not autonomous of the central government, oversee the work of a person trained by the government. In fact, how many of our district assembly representatives have the requisite skills and training to know whether a particular doctor is performing his or her duties satisfactorily? Do they plan to check doctors' attendance records? What a laughable, ludicrous, risible mother lode of ****! It takes a person in the same profession as another to have proper oversight of the affairs of the latter. Can a teacher oversee the work of a lawyer? Can a nurse oversee the work of a dentist? Nope!
  
  Second, decentralization can only succeed via the ballot box. African governments, by virtue of their inordinate love for power, are generally unwilling to allow local government leaders to be independently elected. We all know that, once local leaders are elected at the ballot box, the central government can no longer dictate to their local counterparts, a scenario that most central governments are unwilling to entertain. This irrational fear, and in Ghana's case, is based on the belief that everything must start and end in Accra, which, unfortunately, has contributed greatly to red tape and a lack of development in the regions. In every advanced society where local leaders are elected, such a society has made great strides because, after all, who knows the needs of the local people than the local people themselves?
  
  Third, we cannot single out doctors for accountability when the "boondoggle" called the Mahama administration does not know what the heck it is doing in the name of the people. Many of these young ministers with no more than a bachelor's degree to their names and two or three years in government now have houses in Europe and the U.S.A. Did they acquire these houses on the depth of their salaries? Corruption is rife everywhere, yet those at the helm of affairs think that they ought to control the activities of doctors? That's the biggest joke of the day.
  
  Fourth, I don't blame doctors for the occasional strike because, after all, their long years of specialized training demand that they be remunerated adequately. Being fully aware of their less educated counterparts in government who, in a matter of a few years, have turned from paupers to Ghana's Donald Trumps, doctors have every right to stage the occasional walkout to make sure that the government is not taking them for granted. Unfortunately, the sick become a pawn in the game for control, but the blame can generally be shifted to government when such negotiations break down.
  
  Fifth, if government believes that doctors ought to be paid by the districts, then all government employees in each district should face the same standard. After all, doctors, teachers, and some other professionals are all trained by the taxpayers, so doctors should not be singled out. This argument of singling out doctors sounds so ridiculous, it emanates out of envy, if you ask me! If Mahama and his epigones want to be successful, they need to, first, curb corruption and, second, fix the ailing economy. If, after 57 years of independence, no one in Ghana has the celebral capacity to find a permanent solution to the embarrassing power supply problem Ghana faces today, then we ought to collectively bow down our heads in shame. What a lame society Ghana has become!

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• Abeeku Mensah 11 years ago

  Decentralization is nothing but another name for each locale to generate revenue to fund development projects, overhead costs that include labor cost and other administrative expenses. In Ghana anyone with common sense knows ...
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  Decentralization is nothing but another name for each locale to generate revenue to fund development projects, overhead costs that include labor cost and other administrative expenses. In Ghana anyone with common sense knows that the regions were not created and have never been equal; they are not equal in mineral, natural and human resources. So while the greater Accra-Tema metro and Kumasi metro areas can rely on government employment and other national reimbursements, other regions (without the benefit of large government civil servant offices to provide adequate tax base) can only rely on family farming and or fishing for sustenance which will never generate enough revenue from property and or economic activities to meet local or regional development needs. How then are those locals going to be able to afford and retain qualified medical staffing at their clinics and hospitals? Instead of admitting that the decentralization of Ghana’s rural and urban planning and development scheme is and has been a failure we look to excuses to continue this line of bull crap. We know for a fact that in Ghana rural areas cannot keep qualified teachers and or well managed K12 schools. How are those areas supposed to entice and retain good doctors needed to solve some of the serious problems with village living where old habits die hard and the practice of customs and traditions continue unabated?

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