MMDAs to use 10 per cent of Common Funds for educational infrastructure — Ashanti Regional Minister

Metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies (MMDAs) are required to dedicate 10 per cent of their Common Funds to infrastructure, including classroom blocks and two kindergartens in each of the assemblies.

This is to complement the support from the central government and other agencies in improving educational infrastructure in the region.

The Ashanti Regional Minister, Dr Frank Amoakohene, said this during his appearance before the Local Government and Rural Development Committee of Parliament last Tuesday.

Briefing the committee on legacy projects in the Ashanti Region, Dr Amoakohene said the District Assembly Common Fund (DACF) and the Local Government Ministry had made provisions to ensure that the region would not always depend on the central government for projects.

He said 80 per cent of the Common Fund had been made available to the MMDAs, with most of them having received a minimum of two quarters of their funds.

Those funds, he said, were tied to projects that most of the assemblies had started.

Giving a breakdown of how the funds would be utilised, he said 10 per cent would be used to purchase furniture to support school children in the rural schools and 10 per cent to construct two community-based health compounds for each assembly (CHPS). 

Educational projects

Dr Amoakohene also said the region, with support from the GETFund and the Ministry of Education, is reviving abandoned e-block projects to be completed in good time for use to improve education in the region.

The region had 13 E-blocks under the previous NDC administration that were abandoned.

“Thankfully, with the intervention of the GETFund and the Education Minister, we have been able to repackage these e-block projects so that they will be completed for the use of the good people of the Ashanti Region,” he said.