By Emmanuel Gamson
Takoradi, Nov. 19, GNA – The Sekondi-Takoradi chapter of the Infrastructure Transparency Initiative (CoST) has commissioned an accountability tool to promote greater transparency, and citizens’ participation in infrastructural delivery within Metropolitan, Municipal, and District Assemblies (MMDAs).
The tool, dubbed: “Independent Review Process (IRP)”, would provide a platform for stakeholders to independently review published infrastructure data through disclosure process, and identify key issues of concern, gaps in the data, and areas of good practice.
It would help stakeholders to also put technical jargons into plain language, turning data into compelling information to allow the public to easily understand the main issues associated with a project, and act as a basis for reform or holding decision-makers accountable.
The IPR was commissioned at a workshop, in Takoradi, which brought together officials from MMDAs in the Western Region, representatives from Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), members of the CoST Multi-Stakeholder Group (MSG), and the media among other stakeholders.
Mr Aziz Mahmoud, Monitoring and Evaluation Officer, CoST-Sekondi-Takoradi, speaking at the workshop, said it was to introduce the IPR to participants to help promote a multi-stakeholder engagement to ensure an inclusive and participatory approach to the IRP’s implementation.
He said the IPR had been designed to serve as a manual to guide stakeholders to validate information that MMDAs had disclosed in the public domain on projects that had been delivered over the last five years.
He said: “The essence of this exercise is to help the Assemblies to identify and proffer some corrective measures to improve on the delivery of public infrastructure.
“At the end of the day, the citizens expect that the revenues that they contribute in terms of taxes emanate into projects that benefit their lives, while ensuring value for money.”
Mr Mahmoud stated that Ghana’s huge infrastructure gap was not only a financing problem, but also a governance challenge, despite existing strong legal and regulatory regimes for transparency.
“The issue is implementation and coordination, and so strengthening local infrastructure governance is needed to optimise allocation and expenditure, and the CoST tools and standards together with the national laws can unlock value for money, crowd in finance, and ensure infrastructure truly serves citizens,” he added.
He, thus, encouraged MMDAs to ensure timely disclosure of information on infrastructure projects delivery at every stage of execution to ensure transparency and accountability, while guaranteeing value for money.
GNA
Edited by Justina Paaga/Christian Akorlie