CDD-Ghana and ‘I Am Aware Project’ promote dialogue for improved service delivery in N/R
The Rural Initiatives for Self-Empowerment-Ghana (RISE-Ghana), a non-governmental organisation (NGO) in collaboration with the Centre for Democratic Development-Ghana (CDD-Ghana) is implementing a project to improve governance and quality service delivery at the Gushegu and Karaga Districts in the Northern Region.
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The project, dubbed: “I Am Aware Ghana” (IAA) is being spearheaded by CDD-Ghana with funding support from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation of the USA.
IAA
The IAA project is informed by the development challenges of the Karaga and Gusheigu Districts which were ranked among the least developed districts in the Northern Region in the 2015 District League Table, a social accountability tool by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and CDD-Ghana, which measures the level of development across all the 216 Districts in Ghana in the area of Water, Sanitation, Education, Health, Security and Governance.
In the 2016 DLT, the Karaga District was ranked 207 out of the 216 districts in the country but ranked 193 in the 2017 edition while the Gushegu District placed 210 position in the 2016 but declined to 215 in this year’s ranking.
As part of the project, series of community durbars have been organised in the two districts to educate the people about how they could demand improved services and accountable governance from their duty bearers.
Purpose
Speaking in an interview with Graphic Online after one of the community durbars held at Nyong, a community in the Karaga District, the Executive Director of RISE-Ghana, Mr. Awal Ahmed Kariama, said to help improve the quality of services and responsiveness, the project “is empowering citizen groups to actively participate in local governance”.
“The local governance Act and the planning guidelines provides great opportunities for demand driven development with Citizen playing a key role in that, we are proud to partner CDD-Ghana and the Hewlett Foundation for the innovative “I Am Aware Ghana” project which is creating platforms for meaningful citizen participation and builds on the District League Table (DLT), but let me emphasize that the DLT is not about non-performance”, Mr Kariama explained.
He said the community durbars were organized to educate Citizens on the local governance policy, social accountability and their roles and responsibilities.
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Commendation
Speaking at the event, the Presiding Member (PM) of the Karaga District, Mr Alhassan Mohammed, commended RISE-Ghana and CDD-Ghana for introducing the project to bridge the gap between citizens and duty bearers.
“As the I Am Aware Project is building our capacity to demand transparency and accountability for improved services, they are also telling us that charity begins at home. We must begin demanding accountability from the various Water Boards in our respect communities to use proceeds to improve the water situation as we engage the District Assembly further. The opportunity to present petitions and proposals to various assembly committees is also an important area we must encourage various Citizens like the Attaya Base to use”, he said.