Citizens and Local Government urged to assume joint responsibility

Mamponteng (Ash), July 17, GNA- Mr. Ted Lawrence, Democracy and Governance Team Leader of USAID/Ghana has said that, it was time both citizens and local governments assumed joint responsibility for the total development of the areas and hold each other accountable. He said through this engagement, they could tackle issues of joint concern like quality and healthy education for their children. He said "the most successful local governments have been the ones which create an environment where local government joins citizens to work together to develop their district". Mr. Lawrence, who represented Robert Hellyer, the USAID/Ghana Mission Director, said this at a meeting to announce the end of the second phase of Government Accountability Improves (GAIT) II Programme, in the Kwabre district at Mamponteng on Thursday. He said the true success of GAIT II in the district would be measured by whether the high level of local government-citizen interaction that began under it would continue after the exit of the programme.

The USAID/Ghana Representative commended the Cooperative League of USA (CLUSA) and its implementing partners, Education Development Corporation (EDC), the Institute of Local Government Studies, the Ghana Education Service and the Ministry of Local Government, Rural Development and Environment for working jointly to see the success of the programme and hoped through this partnership, best practices in local governance would be shared and institutionalized in the district. Alhaji Ahmed Akwasi Yeboah, the Kwabre District Chief Executive (DCE) noted that the programme has made very significant contributions to the development of the district, particularly in the area of participatory approaches to local governance. He said, for three years, the GAIT programme through the active engagement of various stakeholders in the activities of the District Assembly, has contributed in making civil society organizations and citizen groups, as well as the people to appreciate their individual and collective responsibilities towards the achievement of the development objectives of the Assembly.

Alhaji Yeboah who enumerated some of the positive results achieved during the three-year operation of the GAIT stressed that the district now had internal resource Persons who have been trained to support and sustain the facilitation techniques initiated by the GAIT II Team. The DCE assured the Programme Manager that the Assembly would ensure the sustainability of the best practices and other issues learnt in the course of the implementation of the programme in the district. He hoped the mutual relationships established between the various collaborative agencies and the Assembly would continue even as the programme was phasing out.

Madam Evelyn Arthur, Chief of Party of the GAIT II Programme, who introduced the internal resources persons of the district to the meeting, and also presented Certificates on behalf of the Programme to certain individuals who contributed to the success of the programme in the district, was full of praise to all stakeholders, and hoped that they would all work together to sustain the gains made. She said under the education component of the project, GAIT directly supported 28 communities in the district to learn and take action to improve on the performance of their schools. A total of 9,800 new cedis, was disbursed to the 28 communities to support implementation of their School Performance Plans (SPP). She later presented the Yamaha Motor, two megaphones, a white board and office furniture which the programme used for its activities to the Kwabre Civic Union and appealed to the DCE to provide an office for the Union to facilitate their work. The way forward information sharing on the district stakeholder strategic plan document was launched at the meeting.