Per Act 936, Local Government Act, 2016, (2), the President may, by Executive Instrument:
(a) declare any area within the country to be a district.
(b) assign a name to the district.
(3) The President shall, in the exercise of the power under paragraph (a) of subsection (2), direct the Electoral Commission to make appropriate recommendations.
(4) The Electoral Commission shall, before making recommendations to the President under (3), consider the following factors (a) in the case of:
(i) a district, that there is a minimum population of seventy-five thousand people;
(ii) a municipality, that there is a minimum of ninety-five thousand people;
(iii) a metropolis, that there is a minimum of two hundred and fifty thousand people; and
(b) the geographical contiguity and economic viability of the area, namely, the ability of an area to provide the basic infrastructural and any other development needs from the monetary and any other resources generated in the area.
The above is the powers vested in the President as far as the creation of Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) are concerned. Ever since President Nana Addo Danquah Akufo-Addo created some new MMDAs, there have been many reservations by some members of the public genuinely expressing worry about the growing number of MMDAs, while others are the politics as usual.
By the year 2000, when the NPP under President J.A.Kufuor took over power, the nation had 110 MMDAs. Before the recent creations of the new MMDAs, the nation had 216 MMDAs. The regional breakdowns were as follows:
Ashanti Region 30
Brong Ahafo 27
Central 20
Eastern 26
Greater Accra 16
Northern 26
Upper East 13
Upper West 11
Volta 25
Western 22
The powers given to the President as quoted above have been used by every President under the Fourth Republic not for political reasons in my view but to ensure that governance descends to the people for effective development. Let me give a typical example of one such decision. In 2000, there was a District in the Western Region known as Juaboso-Bia District. The area was so vast and huge and part of the District shared a border with La Cote d’Ivoire to the extreme east.
The main economic activity of the District was cocoa production, but it had one of the worst road networks in this country in spite of its vastness. Within the Civil and Public Service circles, a posting to Juaboso-Bia District was a punishment. President Kufuor created the Bia District out of it.
The Atta-Mills–Mahama administrations created two Districts out of the Juaboso and the Bia Districts – Bodi and Bia West respectively to make them more governable and enhance development. What was one District in 2000 became four Districts within 16 years.
When these four Districts were one, there was not an inch of tarred road in the whole of this vast area. Under President Kufuor, Juaboso and Bia Districts saw tarred roads and this was continued by the Atta-Mills-Mahama administrations. If Districts stand as individual entities, when the national cake is being shared, all of them benefit irrespective of their sizes and locations. This helps developments to spread.
The other challenge for many Districts also is that in some cases, sections of Districts are deprived of development projects for varied reasons, prominent among them is the distance between the District capital and the ‘outlandish’ settlements. These situations create social and political frictions among the same people within the same District. There are numerous examples of Districts carved out of parent Districts having overcome their initial challenges and improved tremendously.
The present-day Ahanta West Municipal was once part of the then Sekondi Takoradi City Council (STCC) until 1988 when the District was created. For the over 100 years from colonial rule through independence and beyond, the now Ahanta West portion of the then STCC never saw any major development in the area even though it had one of the booming markets from where the STCC collected a lot of revenues on a daily basis.
Thirty years after its ‘independence’, Ahanta West has grown from a poor District to a growing Municipality. There are still so many examples of such in every region of the country.
It is also a fact that many Metropolis and Municipalities are unable to mobilize the internal resources available to them to support the development needs of their geographical areas. Questions that need to be answered are why are many of the Metropolis in the country unable to collect the revenues available to them for the efficient management of the Metropolis? If AMA, KMA, STMA, TEMA and other such Assemblies are able to collect the internal revenues available to them, they may not even need their share of the District Assemblies Common Fund (DACF).
It is a fact that many of the Metropolitan and Municipal Assemblies are expanding much more beyond their reach and management. In the process, so many things go wrong in the new and expanding communities. Spatial Planning supervision has become a serious challenge to many of our MMDAs, particularly the Metropolis and the Municipalities.
In the same vein, revenue collections have been limited to a few industrial and commercial outfits that are very well known as against the numerous expensive residential structures springing up on a daily basis. The creation of new MMDAs therefore creates the opportunity for the new administrations to identify these sources of revenues and collect them for the development of the area.
However, there is one thing which the Local Government Ministry should take a look at. Every new District created out of an existing one contributed towards the capital assets of the old District. The problem confronting many of these new MMDAs is that when they are weaning themselves off the parent MMDAs, they are not given a share of the assets they collectively created. Some begin with no office accommodations, vehicles, furniture and the basic facilities to begin work with.
It is my humble view that the Local Government Ministry must ensure that the parent MMDAs share part of their assets with the newly-created MMDAs to have a smooth take off. It is a fact that some new MMDAs do not have offices for their key staff to begin with even though they had contributed towards the assets in the old MMDAs.
KETA AND ANLOGA PROTESTS.
Did I read right that some citizens in the Keta and Anloga areas of the Volta Region are protesting against the exploration of off-shore oil in their area because it is going to affect them? Eei! Am I reading well? Truth be told – a section of our compatriots in this country think some of us in this same country are . . . I come from the Western Region which produces more than 50 per cent of the nation’s wealth to ensure our collective survival, notwithstanding our challenges.
We have suffered a lot of degradation of the natural resources nature bequeathed to us. Our pristine water bodies have been destroyed because Ghanaians want gold; our forests have been degraded; we suffer environmental pollution because we are mining gold, bauxite, manganese and almost all our major forests have been depleted for timber exports to support Ghana.
At the moment, oil is being drilled in the region as well – an activity which has prevented our fisher folks from fishing in particular portions in the sea for their livelihood. If nature has endowed us with another oil reserves elsewhere in the Volta Region, we are being told that the exploration cannot go on because of what? My goodness! What do they take the rest of us in this country for, especially those whose lands have produced the resources that have ensured our survival till date?
I hope the leaders in those areas will talk to the protestors to stop what they intend doing, else the rest of us will also take a decision. The Western Region has sacrificed so much for the nation for so little. I feel insulted if our compatriots will be so selfish to the detriment of the nation and expect other resources from elsewhere to provide them with the development they need. Every ounce of a resource anywhere belongs to all of us. If that has changed, we should be told.
Daavi, give me four tots of mahogany bitters.
Kb2014gh@gmail.com
From Kwesi Biney