By Mildred Siabi-Mensah
Takoradi, July 19, GNA – The Ghana Anti-Corruption Coalition (GACC) has organized a dissemination forum of its project titled, “From Disclosure to Impact – Mobilizing
Local Civil Society to Verify Published Extractives Data and Advocate for Equitable,
Accountable Spend of Funds”.
The forum sought to open the eyes of participants on how oil monies had been spent in line with value for money and really demand accountability to put government on its toes.
The project monitoring was funded by the African Centre for Energy Policy (ACEP) and carried by Local Accountability Networks (LANets).
Mr. Ebo Barker, the Western Regional lead of the LANet said five projects selected from Western and Central Regions including schools, Fisheries project and sea Defence among others were monitored.
Mr. Barker said most projects visited lacked proper coordination between the assemblies, implementing agencies and the project execution team.
The situation, according to the LANet members, did not encourage accountability or effective execution of contract terms.
Again, contractors in this sense were given undue control with little or no regard for communities and institutions where such pprojectswere executed.
Mr. Bright Sowu, Head of Programmes, GACC said it was time citizens woke up to their civic responsibility of participating actively in the governance space to ensure that politicians worked with them to meet real needs in improving the quality of lives of Ghanaians.
This is because state resources were not for politicians but were mandated to hold it in the trust of the people they served.
He said, “what we need is a clear focus on priorities and strategic investment with rippling effects on other sectors of the economy”.
Some participants noted how partisan politics continued to be a threat to socio-economic development of Ghana.
They unanimously agreed that it was about time citizens rose and fought the “the little here, little their expenditure syndrome”, which did not enhance growth and development.
GNA