SOCIAL: Elections to be used to select new DCEs

Elvis Afriyie Ankrah

Mr Elvis Afriyie Ankrah, Deputy Minister of Local and Rural Development, has said District Chief Executives (DCE) would soon be elected by the registered voters in the districts to ensure that they are accountable to the local people.

He said the President will nominate five persons to be interviewed by the Public Services Commission and select three of them to be elected by the registered voters in the District.

Mr Ankrah said this when addressing the inauguration of the new Municipalities and Districts Assemblies on behalf of the President, at Anfoega in the Volta Region.

He said “the new system of voting would also provide security of tenure for the DCE and help remove the urge for DCEs to contest as Members of Parliament (MP) which he explained is at the root of the conflict between DCEs and MPs”.

Mr Ankrah said “there is also a proposal that the power to hire and dismiss staff of the district assemblies, presently vested in the Head of the Local Government Service, should be transferred to the District Assemblies”.

He said the Government had also designed a program to galvanize district assemblies to play the lead role in creating district-level employment opportunities, raising revenues for the Assemblies to undertake development projects and ensuring that the district led the way in the attainment and consolidation of the middle level country status.

Mr Ankrah said Government had decided to consolidate all the major laws on local government so that in one legislation, a local government practitioner can have access to the entire primary source material on the subject as part of the strategy for enhancing the work of the District Assemblies.

He said the districts have also started benefiting from the GH¢42 million seed capital approved by parliament in the 2012 budget.

He said  “a district resourcing programme is being worked out within the framework of the recently-launched Public-Private partnership strategy to provide each district assembly with an office block, an Assembly Hall, bungalows for the District Chief Executive and the District Coordinating Director, Juniors Staff Quarters for some of the staff and other operational, logistics and equipment support”.

He also presented two vehicles to the North Dayi District Assembly to help deepen the decentralization process and transform the District Assemblies for local development.


GNA