REPEAL DACF ACT TO ALLOW MMDCES DETERMINE NEEDS (PAGE 13, SEPT 6, 2010)

AN Associate Dean of the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), Nana Bright Oduro-Kwateng, has called for the repeal of a section of the District Assemblies Common Fund (DACF) Act that allows the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development and the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning to determine which portions of the approved development plan is to be financed from the fund.
He explained that this will enable the assemblies to decide what they want to use their common fund for on the basis of their own determined priorities.
He noted that under the guise of “Guidelines for the utilisation of the common fund”, that section of the Act had worked to make the common fund releases assume the character of “tied grants”.
Nana Oduro-Kwateng also said the MPs Constituency Common Fund, as an adjunct to the District Assemblies Common Fund, must be de-linked and a separate MPs Constituency Common Fund to be funded out of the Consolidated Fund and administered by the Parliamentary Service established.
This was contained in a paper he presented at a retreat organised by the Western Regional Coordinating Council for Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives (MMDCEs), as well as Members of Parliament (MPs) and heads of departments in the region at Busua.
Speaking on the topic: “Building understanding of the roles and relationship between MMDCEs and MPs”, he said the re-centralisation of the education, health, fire, forestry and Game and Wildlife sectors under the Local Government Service Act was a step backwards towards efforts to decentralise the public service.
He said the private sector could not be an engine of growth if “we do not have an efficient public sector”.
Nana Oduro-Kwateng noted that political stability, supported by social cohesion and tolerance had provided a favourable environment for economic development.
“Despite such progress, there are significant governance challenges, including weak central and local level governance, institutional power that is centralised and excessively concentrated in the executive and inefficient public sector”, he pointed out.
On the local level, he said three interlocking governance challenges were likely to dominate the country’s immediate future, adding “These are improving service delivery to citizens, expanding public participation in governance and managing Ghana’s natural resources”.
The associate dean said a strong democracy required two important elements which included popular participation at the local level and popular participation at the national level.
The two, he explained, were inter-connected and that if popular participation at the grass roots continued to decline in the country, then ultimately the national body politics would not be immune from the consequences.
Nana Oduro-Kwateng said flourishing grass roots were only likely where local people understood what local government represented in terms of both policy and resources, and where they could hold local government accountable for its performance.
“An efficient local government system is the only way to tackle our development problems”, he emphasised.