As part of rebranding the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA) and getting the media to carry the Assembly's messages to the citizens to enable more participation, a day’s workshop on the structure of the Local Government System and Resource mobilization has been held at SSNIT conference hall,Kumasi.
The Ashanti
Regional Minister who doubles as Acting Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA)
Chief Executive called on the media practitioners in the country especially
those in Ashanti Region to focus more on the local government sector.
He said the need
for the media to take key interest and continue to educate themselves well
about the Local governance and the decentralization policy among other areas in
order to educate their audience cannot be overemphasized.
“I am
challenging you (media) to study hard in this sector and aspire to become
future experts of local governance.
The former
Obuasi Municipal Chief Executive who is also 2016 NDC Parliamentary candidate
for Obuasi west entreated the media practitioners to put their hands on deck to
help the various MMDAs in the region to promote development in all their
endeavours.
In his
presentation, Dr.Eric Oduro Osae of Institute of Local Government Studies
(ILGS) which focused on history of Local
Government and decentralization in Ghana, Rational-new local government system,
legal framework-local governance in Ghana, structure-new local government
system, functions responsibility of functionaries in Ghana’s local government
system.
Dr.Osae
challenged the media to partner with the KMA as government just as they do with
Parliament, office of the President and the courts; report allowable
proceedings and decisions of the general assembly in collaboration with the
office of the Coordinating Director.
“Help in
rebranding KMA and solicit citizens
participation in governance ,help bring governance closer to the people of
Kumasi and carry messages to the national level on the needs of the Assembly
for urgent attention due to wide coverage”, he urged.
Dr.Osae
mentioned that, the vision of KMA is to become a safe city and investment
destination for both local and international with the mission to improve the
quality of life of the people in the metropolis through the provision of
essential services and creation of enabling environment for all etc.
He asserted that
any District Assembly which jokes with the media is in trouble and urged all
MMADs, especially the KMA to do well in their partnership with the media at all
time.
The Local
Government expert said the Members of Parliament (MPs) will no longer be part
or members of the MMDAs effective 2017 when the new law implementation takes
off because findings indicate that they don’t attend meetings and even when
they attend most of them don’t contribute to the Assembly. To this end there is
urgent need for the MMDAs to endeavour to deepen their relationship with the
media to help in educating the public especially in the area of participation,
revenue mobilization among other areas.
He appealed to
the media to focus more in the local government sector as part of measures of
making to ensure that the decentralization works effectively. According to
Dr.Eric Oduro Osei, for the assemblies to ensure the effective functioning of
the unit committee which are most closers to the people cannot be overemphasized
to ensure development as well as check and balances.
Mr.Pat Hagan, a
former Ashanti Regional National Development Planning Officer on his part urged
the media to intensify education on the need for the citizens to honour their
tax obligations since the sharing of the Common fund is based on five factors
with one been common factor where about 50% of the fund is share across all
Assemblies, need factor,service pressure factor, responsive factor – the more
Internal Generated Funds(IGF) the more IGF you collect the more Common fund .
Mr.Aseidu the
Regional Budget Officer charged the media practitioners to also identify more
potential revenue sources to enable KMA and other Assemblies to maximize the assemblies’
mobilization drive.
He also called
for change of attitude on the part of the all Ghanaians to honour their civil
responsibility especially the paying of taxes, fees, rate etc
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