By P.K.Yankey
Daboase (W/R), July 4, GNA- Friends of the Nation (FoN), in collaboration with the Wassa-East District Assembly, has held a two-day training workshop to build capacities of stakeholders on the use of the Mineral Development Fund (MDF) for development projects in the Wassa-East District.
It formed part of the Strategic Partnership Initiative for Ghana and West Africa.
It is also a part of series of training to empower participants with the skills to monitor and track Mineral Development -Funded projects in the District Assembly in line with FoN’s core mandate to ensure environmental justice, accountability and sustainability.
Nana Efua Ewur, the Monitoring and Evaluation Coordinator at FoN, said the training would boost the capacities of stakeholders in the extractive communities to know the benefits of mining and how the MDF was utilized.
She said the training would also boost their capacities and empower them to know how to track MDF-Funded projects by the District Assembly.
Nana Ewur said environmental governance was key to the organization, and with support from the District Assembly, the NGO would continue to deepen advocacy to sensitize communities and create awareness on issues affecting the people.
She said the NGO also partnered with mining companies to fashion out proper modalities on the allocation, disbursement and use of the MDF-FUNDED projects to make them more accountable to the host communities and reduce tensions.
Mr William Augustine -Denkyi ,a Project Officer with FoN, encouraged participants to monitor MDF-FUNDED developmental projects from the start to completion of such projects.
He said they had a right to move to the projects sites and demand quality work from contractors as well as the value of the projects.
Mr Augustine-Denkyi said it was the duty of participants to continue to evaluate MDF-FUNDED projects to ensure that they were in use after the District Assembly had handed them over to the respective communities.
That , he noted, would ensure value for money in the quest for quality and standard projects that would have a longer life span.
GNA
Edited by Justina Paaga/Christian Akorlie