By Chernor Alimamy Kamara
The Institute for Governance Reforms (IGR) has launched the first Local Governance and Services Tracker (LGST) to promote constructive engagements between citizens, the Central Government, and Local Councils.
The launch at the Ministry of Local Government and Community Affairs on the 4th of March 2024 saw the Project Lead, Professor Fredline M’Cormack-Hale explaining how the tracker will be working in 6 pilot districts of Western Rural, Moyamba, Karene, Falaba, Tonkolili, and Kono.
She said the project is expected to increase citizens’ participation in local government and policy processes within their localities, with the hope of increasing the council’s engagement and providing platforms through which citizens can liaise and engage with service providers and policymakers. She added that the project also aims to enhance local district and chiefdom authorities’ responsiveness to the priorities and needs of citizens and to collaboratively improve Agriculture, education, and health.
Professor McCormack-Hale pointed out that by improving accountability and performance in the aforementioned areas, one of the key outcomes would be the strengthening of the social contract between the State and citizens. She acknowledged the role played by local Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) and the media in this process of facilitating engagements between institutions and citizens-driven data, and the ministries.
She said the major aspect of the citizens-driven data dashboard or LGST which is an online citizens scorecard, is to enable stakeholders, government and civil societies to work collaboratively to be able to see the contributions that both provide towards improving service delivery outcomes,” she said.
She explained that the data that will be collected and aggregated will demonstrate the average performance of local councils and districts in the targeted sectors.
In his statement, Minister of Local Government and Community Affairs, Tamba Lamina stated that the tracker is very innovative in the governance system and said the local government ministry is opening its doors to be assessed in various areas.
He appreciated the fact that it was a constructive engagement with citizens that involved six councils and described signing a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on behalf of the six local councils as a significant moment.
USAID Representative, Moi Settu said the tracker’s activity works to foster the social contract between local government and citizens in Sierra Leone by scaling up successful initiatives that support local government and relevant national government institutions, civil societies, and the citizenry. He noted that the overall goal of the dashboard is to increase citizens’ participation in local government and political processes and to foster the creation of critical services by local government institutions through processes that are transparent and accountable to citizens.
He hoped that citizens would increasingly exercise their rights and responsibilities in local governance processes.
A PowerPoint presentation on the dashboard/tracker by the Executive Director of IGR, Andrew Lavali was a key highlight of the event.
Copyright © 2024 Politico (11/03/24)
