The recent decentralisation review exercise has revealed that there are widespread concerns about the ability of the district assemblies to manage resources, deliver expected resources and generally execute local development.
They were also found wanting in the delivery of expected services, undertaking consistent consultation and the provision of timely and adequate feedback on issues pertaining to local government.
This was made known by the Minister of Local Government and Rural Development (MLGRD), Mr Joseph Yieleh-Chireh, when he delivered the key note address at a two-day workshop on capacity building, training and education responsibilities in the local government sector in Ho.
Participants were drawn from Councils of the Local Government Service (LGS) and the Institute of Local Government Studies (ILGS).
Mr Yieleh-Chireh said the findings posed a great challenge to the local government sector and they must chart a way forward to ensure coherence, consistency and sustainability.
He charged the participants to use the workshop to come out with ways on how best to optimise the strengths of respective organisations and other stakeholders in local governance.
He stressed the need for a common agenda in ensuring that local authorities had competent technical and administrative staff to implement the decisions of assemblies.
He also stressed the need to support assemblies to make good decisions by making sure that citizens and their representatives — assembly members — were aware of and understood the issues and possibilities in government policy and programmes.
In an address, the Chairman of LGS, Professor F.M Andam, expressed the desire that the MLGRD could go beyond training to provide more infrastructure in remote areas, and that the task facing the sector should be seen as a shared responsibility.
He also advocated a common fund, development partner funds and ancillary funds to buttress the essence of capacity building for a common goal.
For his part, the Chairman of ILGS, Professor S.M Quartey, commended the MLGRD for taking the initiative to fill the void because inspite of all duplications there had not been any forum to iron out conflicts between the mandates of ILS and ILGS as far back as 1999.
In a welcoming address, the Deputy Volta Regional Minister, Colonel Cyril Necku (rtd), said the workshop was relevant in view of its role in the restructuring of the local government system, adding that capacity building was an essential component of institutional service delivery, and that, “ a system that refuses to build the capacity of or train and educate its work force is definitely bound to fail in achieving its objectives”.
The former chairman of the Public Services Commission, Professor S.N. Wood, who chaired the function expressed the optimism that at the end of it all matters of duplication would be resolved to drive the decentralisation initiatives forward.
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