La Dade-Kotopon MCE has passion for dev.
The first Municipal Chief Executive (MCE) for the La Dade-Kotopon Municipal Assembly (LaDMA), Ms Rita Odoley Sowah, is the only female chief executive in the Greater Accra Region.
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The municipal assembly was carved out of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) in 2012 and has 10 electoral areas with Nii Amasah Namoale as its Member of Parliament (MP).
A mother of one, Ms Sowah is a secretary by profession and a native of La where she has lived all her life.
Passion for development
With a passion to see development in her municipality, Ms Sowah entered politics unconsciously.
Working as a secretary at the National Lotteries Authority for nine years in the 90s, Ms Sowah was always passionate about people exercising their franchise.
With no political party in mind, she would normally provide people with non-alcoholic beverages to encourage them to vote during elections so that they could choose the best people to develop the La community.
She discovered her interest in politics in 2005 when she worked as a secretary to the MP for the area.
For seven years, she worked as the Personal Assistant (PA) to the MP where she got the opportunity to interact with people in the community and got to know of their needs.
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She became more committed to improving on the lives of her people when she, together with the MP, toured all the nooks and crannies of the constituency.
In 2012, she decided to step up her game in politics when she picked a form at her party’s primaries to contest as the MP for La.
Ms Sowah, after going round the constituency to get people to endorse her forms, later rescinded her decision to contest when she realised her “boss” was still in the race so she stepped down for him.
As fate would have it, La was carved out of the AMA when new districts, municipalities and metropolitan assemblies were created in 2012.
Ms sowah applied for the position of MCE for LaDMA together with three other men and they went for an interview.
She was shortlisted and later nominated for the position and was endorsed at the assembly level last year.
After being in office for the last six months, Ms Sowah says her main concern now is to improve on the health, education and infrastructural needs of the people.
Her vision for the constituency
In the area of education, she said she wanted to improve on both the infrastructural needs, especially at the public level, as well as ensure quality education for the youth.
To this end, she is working with the municipal education directorate to improve on the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) results of the municipality saying that the 2013 results of candidates in the district was nothing to write home about.
Also, she together with the assembly, have mapped out strategies which included visits to clan houses and parents to ensure that they did not only send their children to school but also take an active interest in their education.
She said with the Free Compulsory Universal Basic Education (FCUBE) programme, free school uniforms and school feeding programme, among other interventions that the government had put in place, she would ensure that children and the youth in her municipality made use of opportunities to excel.
Together with some development partners in the municipality, Ms Sowah said she was working at providing a library and an Information Communications Technology (ICT) centre for the La cluster of schools to make them more abreast of modern ways of learning.
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The assembly, she said, was also looking at setting up an education fund for senior high school students in the municipality, in order to get the less privileged to continue their education and added that the assembly had so far assisted a medical student and two SHS graduates to complete their education.
Also, she said, there were skills training programmes for girls who due to one reason or the other, had dropped out of school to ensure that they did not become a burden on the society in the future.
In the area of health, she said, the assembly was looking at making the already existing facilities, such as the La General Hospital, the Police Hospital and the Tse Addo Clinic more accessible to the people.
More projects
The assembly will also improve on the facilities at the La Community Clinic which was a CHPS compound to be more responsible to the health needs of the people.
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On improving the infrastructural needs of the municipality, Ms Sowah said the assembly was also making progress through a public-private partnership agreement to build a new market for the La market women and added the assembly was waiting for clearance from the Ministry of Finance to kick-start the project.
In the area of water and sanitation, she said she had met with the water and sanitation agency in the community and so far the water supplyto the people had been improved whereas she had instructed solid waste contractors to provide waste bins at various homes and locations in the municipality.
Like any other old community in the country, Ms Sowah said sanitation in the municipality was not too good and therefore, the assembly was serving letters to households and shop owners to keep their surroundings clean.
After completing two Ghana@50 public toilets, the assembly was in the process of serving notice to all households to ensure that they had places of convenience since public places of convenience were not meant for household use.
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Her advice to women
According to her, it is a tough road but with determination in mind, every woman could make it saying that she enjoys tremendous support from the MP and La Constitency Chairman, Mr Magnus Ayitey.
Ms Sowah has therefore called on women not to underrate themselves but take up challenging roles to bring out their best qualities.
She said competing her position with three other men was difficult but was quick to add that “it is always the beginning of things that seem difficult” and therefore encouraged women and young girls not to give up no matter the circumstance they found themselves.
Writer's email-rebecca.quaicoe-duho@graphic.com.gh