Implement concept of decentralisation now — Agbogah

A former Presiding Member of the Ho Municipal Assembly, Mr Simon Kofi Agbogah, has called for total decentralisation now or never to end what he described as the semi-decentralisation system that has been practised for a long time.

He said the implementation of the concept of decentralisation had been slow and half-hearted and that it lacked political will and total commitment.

Inability to cede power to assemblies 

“The morbid fear of ceding power to the assemblies is stifling the zeal of translating this laudable idea of total decentralisation into reality. This poses a serious challenge to all our governments”, Mr Agbogah said.

Mr Agbogah, who is the headmaster of Sacred Heart Senior High School in Ho, said since 1993, under Act 462, the assemblies had remained only partially decentralised and that no government had the political will to decentralise its financial authority.

He said the assemblies still heavily depended on the central government to survive and carry out their development.

Statutory allocation to the assemblies, the Common Fund, is irregular, erratic and unreliable. How many assemblies in Ghana now can solely depend on their Internally Generated Fund (IGFs) and survive, he queried.

Revenue mobilisation

Mr Agbogah said one of the very important primary functions of the assemblies was revenue mobilisation to promote their development programmes, adding that they are expected to become financially viable through IGFs.

“When this is achieved, the Common Fund becomes a supplement and the assemblies were expected to use innovative and creative ways to mobilise revenue and become financially independent and fully decentralised,” he said.

Analytical assembly members

On the quality of assembly members he stated that they were expected to be analytical to enable them to legislate and properly discuss the assembly budgets and all developmental programmes geared towards improving the lives of the people at the grass-roots.