At a seminar with officials of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP), IDEG made a strong case for active partisan involvement in local governance which focuses on development.

[contextly_sidebar id=”5qWZrzcrkPecikcKQ5AS0JZgMuDYpAEe”]The Executive Director of IDEG, Dr. Emmanuel Akwetey, also urged government to adopt what he termed as the mixed member proportional representation to encourage more women representation, and marginally deprived within the country’s local governance system.

“We think that if the assemblies are going to be elected, how we would strengthen women’s representation, how we would strengthen youth, disability and other marginal groups including even that epic minority, if there are situations like that. So let’s do the first past the post, but let’s also introduce mixed member proportional representation,” he said.

Debate over MMDCEs election

The debate of election of MMDCEs has lingered for some time, with some Ghanaians looking forward to its implementation.

The proposal has received varied views from analysts in the field of local governance.

Whereas some have complained that the country’s local governance system risk sabotage if MMDCEs are elected, others think otherwise.

The fear of sabotage stems from the fact that, an MCE could be elected from an opposition party, whereas the Central government will be controlled by another party.

The suggestion is that, such an MCE may be sabotaged by central government, by way of they refusing to allocate the necessary resources to him or her to achieve the Assembly’s set objectives.

NPP promises to make it possible 

The New Patriotic Party (NPP) in its 2016 manifesto, promised to “oversee the direct election of Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives (MMDCEs) within 24 months of election into office, to coincide with the next District Assembly elections in 2019.”

This was reaffirmed by the President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo who promised that “In 2018, we are going to move to fully elected District Assembly representations including the choice of the District chief Executive (DCE). It is going to be done by the people of the districts and no longer by the nomination of the President.”

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By: Godwin Akweiteh Allotey/citifmonline.com/Ghana
Follow @AlloteyGodwin

The post MMDCEs election: IDEG allays sabotage fears appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

The Constitutional Review Committee (CRC), earlier in its recommendations, proposed that Metropolitan Chief Executives should be popularly contested.

However, according to the Interim Chairman of GGDP, Kwamena Essilfie Adjaye, all three local governance structures should elect their leaders by popular elections.

This he says will prevent what he calls the “hypocritical nature of the non-partisan status quo.”

“We are of the opinion that all three levels should be popularly elected not as the constitutional review commission recommended that only metropolitan chiefs should be elected. We want metropolitan, municipal and district chief executives all three popularly elected… The current system is supposed to be non partisan, it is not true, it is partisan, it is not working well. So many times in many areas you have contested elections because the president’s nominee is not accepted,” he said.

Speaking at the official launch of the group’s public debate on how the constitutional review process should be completed in Accra, Mr. Adjaye said, “we have taken stock of the reality and we are saying if decentralization is fully implemented, if they are being popularly elected, then naturally it will become partisan as is electing the president or electing members of parliament.”

The election of a new presiding member for the Kumasi Municipal Assembly (KMA), fraught with mild clashes, hit a dead end after the ninth time.

Mr. Adjaye believes electing MMDCEs by popular voting will prevent such situations from occurring.

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By: Caleb Kudah/citifmonline.com/Ghana

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