Forum on OGP calls for openness in governance process

Sekondi, Sept. 8, GNA
– Some members of the Multi-Stakeholder Forum set up by the Open Governance
Partnership (OGP) Project have called for openness in the governance process
and availability of information by the assemblies.

A survey on
participation and openness in governance conducted by the Project Team revealed
that 81 per cent of the 1,141 respondents were not happy about the lack of
openness between the assemblies and the people they manage.

At a brainstorming
workshop to solicit inputs into selected commitments of operational areas at
Sekondi revealed that more and more engagements needed to be carried out by
city authorities for effective local governance.

The commitments
include; Public Participation, Public Service, Fiscal Transparency and Civic
Education and Participation to improve public service delivery in the
assemblies.

The outcome would aid
in the drafting of the 2018 OGP local Action Plan.

Mr Kwame Lan Tugbenu,
the Metro Officer of the National Commission on Civic Education, who spoke on
techniques of community engagement to enhance information sharing, entreated
the Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolitan Assembly to do proper targeting and
segmenting in order to have the full participation of the citizenry.

The Assembly members,
he said, must also communicate information of their sittings to their
constituents and charged them to document outcomes of meetings, have a
succession plan and design rules and procedures for their operations.

He called on the
citizenry to engage in voluntarism, be more concerned about issues that
affected their welfare and take active part in finding solutions, particularly
at the local communities, for holistic development.

GNA