Sunyani Municipal Assembly qualifies again for Fund

The Sunyani Municipal Assembly (SMA) has for the fourth time since 2009 qualified for the Functional Organisational Assessment Tool (FOAT), Mr. Kwasi Oppong-Ababio, Municipal Chief Executive, has said.

He said the Assembly qualified in 2009, 2010, 2011 and had accordingly received the allocated funds for the three consecutive years, adding that the 2012 allocation was yet to be released.

Mr. Oppong-Ababio, who was spoke to the GNA following his confirmation, said to qualify for the funding was no mean task.

He explained the FOAT criteria looked at the general performance of the Assemblies on a very broad spectrum, saying that the account of the day-to-day activities of the Assemblies were provided for scrutiny by the assessment team.

FOAT is a donor fund comprising the District Development Facility (DDF) and Urban Development Grant (UDG) for the Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) to undertake investments and capacity building projects.

The DDF is meant for all the MMDAs while the UDG is for the Metropolitan and Municipal Assemblies (MMAs) alone.

He said the Assembly received GHc315,000 from the DDF in 2009, GHc790,479.59 and GHc592,229.00 from the UDG and DDF in 2010 while the 2011 was GHc673,580.16 and GHc521,706.00 from the UDG and DDF.

He said the funding had had a great impact on the residents in the Municipality because that had enabled the Assembly to execute a number of development projects.

Mr. Oppong-Ababio stated that the projects included education, health, water and sanitation facilities in mostly deprived communities in the Municipality.

The MCE cited the construction of Community-based Health Planning Services (CHPS) Compounds that could be upgraded to Health Centres at Atuahenekrom and Yawhima, 20-seater Water-Closet (WC) facilities at New Dormaa and Atuahenekrom.

He said others were sick bays at St. James Seminary/Senior High School in Sunyani, Day-Care Centres at Jinijini and Mensakrom, teachers’ quarters with borehole at Wawasua and a three classroom block for the Abesim Presbyterian Primary School.

The rest are a six classroom storey blocks with offices and stores for the Abesim Roman Catholic Primary School as well as the Nyamaa and Methodist Basic Schools in Sunyani.