According to CDD-Ghana, the likes of Accra Metropolitan Assembly, Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly and the Tema Metropolitan Assembly, must be taken off government subventions and made to depend on their internally generated resources.

Speaking on the Citi Breakfast Show on Friday, Head of Research at the Centre for Democratic Development (CDD), Dr. Franklin Oduro, said “It doesn’t make sense to some of us that resource-endowed districts that can generate enough IGF [internally generated funds] like AMA, KMA, TMA, should receive the same kind of allocations as other districts that are not doing well.”

[contextly_sidebar id=”5AmKKCPzaVAEFPIx10Tq8W7pmcu7RAdW”]“We have consistently made recommendations in terms of devising new ways of resourcing districts that are not doing well. We have consistently argued for the need to take a second look at the district assembly common fund formula. One way that the ministry or all of us can begin to look at this is that, we take a second look at the formula so we can have targeted resource allocation to districts that are not really doing well. So that we can ensure that citizens living everywhere can have the same facility,” he added.

Dr. Oduro made the recommendation on the back of the ranking of the various Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) tabulated  by CDD-Ghana in collaboration with the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, and UNICEF Ghana.

The CDD research head explained that, the District League Table is to ensure equity across the country.

“It is to find a way to measure whether the services that the government of Ghana including the local government institutions are mandated to provide, we are achieving that progress or not,” he added.

TMA tops 2017 District League Table, Krachi East last

The 2017 district league table, which was released on Thursday, saw TMA clinging to the topmost position with Krachi East district in the Volta Region languishing at the bottom.

The Tema Metropolitan Assembly overtook the La Nkwantanang-Madina Municipality which topped the 2016 UNICEF District League Table.

The Tema Metropolitan Assembly had previously topped the table in 2015.

MMDAs can survive without common fund

The Tema Metropolitan Chief Executive, Felix Mensah Nii Anang-La, had in an earlier interview on the Citi Breakfast few weeks ago, stated that some of the MMDAs can survive without government support.

He noted that the funds they generate internally are even more than what they receive from government.

“In Tema, our IGF is always more than what we get from common fund. It has never been a case where common fund will be bigger than IGF. It is about four times what we receive from common fund,” he said.

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By: Godwin Akweiteh Allotey/citifmonline.com/Ghana
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The Eastern Region was however noted to be the worst performing region, although in general, all 10 regions improved their scores significantly.

This District League Table is tabulated in collaboration with the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, UNICEF Ghana and the Ghana Center for Democratic Development (CDD Ghana).

It was introduced in 2014 as a social accountability tool that ranks Ghana’s 216 MMDAs by their level of development and service delivery.

Based on consultations with the Ministries and Agencies concerned, the District League Table uses indicators from 6 key sectors namely health, education, sanitation, water, governance and security – to compile a single score for each assembly.

The 2017 UNICEF District League Table report noted that Krachi East had a score of 50.6, indicating that the bottom score improved from 2016, when the lowest score of 40.9 was recorded by North Tongu.

“The national average score is 64.7, below which 102 Districts are found – this compares with an average of 58.9 last year,” the report noted.”

Despite the progress made, it added that “with an eventual target of a score of 100%, it is clear that the majority of Districts are still far from this goal.”

The full ranking can be viewed here

Tema Metropolitan Assembly on top

Once again, a district in the Greater Accra Region, the Tema Metropolitan Assembly, was the highest-ranked district with a score of 80.

The Tema Metropolitan Assembly overtook the La Nkwantanang-Madina Municipality which topped the 2016 UNICEF District League Table.

The Tema Metropolitan Assembly had previously topped the table in 2015.

According to the report, “almost half of the top 20 Districts are Municipalities or Metropolitans. However, several less well-off Districts that ranked much lower in previous years have risen to the top 20, such as Lawra in Upper West and Pusiga in Upper East.”

Improvement in sanitation

No district in Ghana has been certified as Open Defecation-Free, under the sanitation indicator.

Only about 4 percent of the districts in Ghana have over one-third of their communities free of open defecation.

But the report still noted sanitation as a “key area of improvement” as eight districts; Kumbungu, Mion, and Tatale Sanguli in Northern Region, Bawku West and Pusiga in Upper East, and Lambussie Karni, Nandom and Wa East in Upper West Region, have now managed to certify more than one-third of their communities as Open Defecation Free.

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By: Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana

The post TMA tops 2017 District League Table, Krachi East last appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

The DLT, which was introduced in 2014 and is released annually, is a social accountability tool that ranks the level of development or the progress of delivering key basic services in the country’s 216 districts.

The purpose of the pre-launch engagement was to share the outcomes and lessons learned from the three years of implementing the DLT, and to allow stakeholders to familiarize themselves with the objectives, process and outcomes of the initiative and to brief stakeholders on the 2017 DLT.

Speaking at the event, the Northern Regional Minister, Hon Salifu Saeed, underscored the importance of social accountability as a fundamental tool for effective governance and public service delivery, and hence tasked all MMDAs in the region to be more proactive and identify sectors where they have shortfalls, in terms of the provision of quality service delivery, and re-strategize to overcome those shortfalls.

He said MMDAs are development vehicles that are responsible to improve the socio-economic needs of citizens through the provision of quality service.

Mr. Salifu Saeed thus expressed gratitude to CDD-Ghana, UNICEF, and the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development (MLGRD), for the initiative.

He asked all the Ministries Departments and Agencies (MDAs), CDD-Ghana and UNICEF to ensure the needed co-operation and assistance to enable them develop the 2017 DLT report on time.

In her remarks, Madam Mable Amoako Atta from the Head of Local Government Service said, “the DLT is not out there to name and shame non-performing MMDAs, but to intensify the scrutiny of Ghana’s development, highlighting inequality across districts, and could also be used to better allocate resources to those individual districts that ranked low to be better supported.”

She therefore encouraged all MMDAs to take the DLT more seriously in order to improve service delivery.

On his part, Mr. Paul Osei-Kuffour, Programs Manager for CDD-Ghana-Tamale Office, who commended all stakeholders for their massive turnout for this year’s pre-launch, also indicated that, “there is the need to stimulate citizens’ engagement with duty bearers over issues affecting their lives, both in terms of access and quality of services, which had been identified in the development discourse as critical for promoting participation, transparency, responsiveness and accountability.”

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By: Latif Mahama/citifmonline.com/Ghana

The post CDD launches 2017 Northern Region District League Table appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

She describes the end as a “beautiful passing on” but says his death and burial came as a relief to her after his long health struggles.

“There were times I was telling the doctors I think enough is enough,” Maki Mandela says in an exclusive interview with CNN from her home in Johannesburg.

“As doctors they had their duty to try everything up to the last moment, but for me as a daughter it was excruciating watching that.”

The former South African President, who led his country out of decades of apartheid after being imprisoned 27 years, died in December at age 95.

For a year before his death, her father was on dialysis for kidney failure and a ventilator to help him breathe. He was fed intravenously through tubes into his stomach, and his arms and hands grew swollen due to the intravenous antibiotics and other medications he was receiving.

Bedridden and incontinent, the Nobel Peace Prize winner had no quality of life, his daughter says.

Recently writing in favor of assisted dying, former Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu questioned the treatment of Nelson Mandela in his final months, saying it was “disgraceful.” In an editorial for Britain’s The Observer, Tutu singled out South African President Jacob Zuma and other politicians who took photos with a clearly confused and ill Mandela and called it an “affront to his dignity.”

Maki Mandela says she constantly questioned her father’s team of state medical doctors about why his life was being prolonged.

“I said, ‘Guys, when do we accept that we have reached the end and we can’t play God?’ ”

But she says she accepted the doctors’ decisions and knows they were bound to “try everything.”

She says she couldn’t fault the care and dedication of the team of medics and nurses who looked after her father 24 hours a day. “They treated him with dignity and respect,” she says.

Throughout his long illness, his heart remained strong, perhaps not surprising for a man who dedicated his life to the struggle against apartheid and helped to lead his nation to democracy.

“When the heart started giving, it was a matter of days,” Maki Mandela says.

The anti-apartheid icon was buried on his farm in Qunu, a remote rural area in the Eastern Cape where he grew up.

“That whole place is a quarry. We had to dynamite the place for us to create his burial place,” Maki Mandela says, adding that her father chose the location.

In keeping with traditions of his Xhosa tribe, Nelson Mandela was laid to rest on a reed mat on the floor of the grave, as if he had gone to sleep like his ancestors did in generations past. The architecture of the grave is such that his coffin is not covered with soil, which is considered bad luck.

Maki Mandela says she and most family members have not been to visit his grave recently but hope to do so soon.

“People are starting to say, make requests, ‘Can we visit the grave?’ ” she says.

She says it’s too early now but expects the family will open the area to visitors and tourists in a year or so.

Plans are in place for a visitors’ center and memorial garden, where tourists will be able to walk around the grave and see it from a viewing point.

And in homage to Nelson Mandela’s royal lineage and his monumental legacy, his family has given the grave site the nickname of “The Big House.”

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Source: CNN

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