A session to train Regional and District Budget Analysts and Coordinating Directors of Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) and Regional Coordinating Councils (RCC) on the Ghana Integrated Financial Management Information Service (GIFMIS) under the Gulf of Guinea Northern Regions Social Cohesion (SOCO) Project implementing beneficiary communities has been organised in Tamale, Northern Region.

The session equipped participants with a comprehensive understanding of the SOCO Project's goals and operational frameworks, focusing on enhancing regional collaboration and socio-economic resilience in the Northern regions of the Gulf of Guinea countries.  

Participants were taken through the Project's components, including investments in community resilience, youth entrepreneurship, and establishment of regional coordination platform.

The financial management system of the Project was highlighted, emphasising the importance of efficient fund utilization and adherence to the World Bank's guidelines. The session also outlined the disbursement arrangements, including the flow of funds from the World Bank to designated accounts and allocation of funds to District Assemblies (DAs) based on vulnerability indices and defined formulas of the Project.

Participants were informed about eligible and ineligible expenditures to ensure compliance and transparency.

The GIFMIS is an ICT-based platform used by the Government of Ghana to improve public financial management by managing commitments, processing payment claims, and producing financial reports.

Participants learned about the challenges faced by the Public Finances Management (PFM) system in Ghana and the benefits of implementing GIFMIS, including improved financial data consolidation and transparency. Overall, the orientation and training sessions provided a solid foundation for participants to contribute meaningfully to the success of the SOCO project.

Source: Stephanie Edem Klutse

               (MLGDRD, Public Relations Unit)

As part of capacity building requirements under the Gulf of Guinea Northern Regions Social Cohesion (SOCO) Project, Metropolitan, Municipal, and District Assemblies (MMDAs) and their Regional Coordinating Councils from beneficiary communities have been trained on Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) on the Project.

The training, which spans four days, was done concurrently in three zones, namely Tamale, Wa, and Bolga, for focal persons on the SOCO project to undertake effective and efficient monitoring of infrastructure to collect data on its activities during its implementation to gain a conceptual understanding on compliance, diagnostic and performance monitoring of the Project activities.

Participants were to trained to monitor and evaluate the Project's effectiveness, coherence, efficiency, relevance, impact and sustainability whenever they embark on monitoring and evaluation to ascertain the progress of infrastructural work under the SOCO.

The training, was attended by project focal persons made up of social safeguards on the Project, planners, engineers, social welfare officers, and Management Information System specialists from the beneficiary Assemblies.

The SOCO project focuses on enhancing regional collaboration and socio-economic resilience in the Northern regions of the Gulf of Guinea countries (Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana, Togo, and Benin). The project aims to address challenges such as FCV spillover risks, perception of exclusion, climate impact, and COVID-19 shocks.

Its geographic focus includes six regions: Savannah, Oti, Upper East, Northern, Upper West, and North East, with the Ministry of Local Government serving as the implementation agency.

Source:           Matilda Tettey

                        (MLGDRD, Public Relations Unit)

The Ministry of Local Government, Decentralisation and Rural Development (MLGDRD) has held a stakeholder engagement meeting with the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre (GIPC) on the validation and roll-out of the Investor Grievance Mechanisms (IGM) to help resolve conflicts between Investors and Government Agencies.

The meeting was held at the Ministry as a follow up on a number of meetings held to discuss the validation of a draft guidelines on the IGM.

The IGM is a problem-solving mechanism which serves as a mediator between an investor and a Government Agency. This initiative is to help ensure that the investor is heard and also the laws of the country are adhered to when there is a conflict.

The delegation from GIPC stated the important role MLGDRD has to play in ensuring the success of the IGM initiative at the local level and sought for the support of the Ministry to help roll-out the project and validate it to make it official.

The team from MLGDRD led by Madam Priscilla Attipoe, the Deputy Director for General Administration raised concerns about the need for exploring exhaustibly the avenues for   making a complaint, stressing the need to be stated in the document that, all avenues of resolving a conflict between an investor and a government agency must be explored at the Local Governance level before the IGM is engaged.

The team from the Ministry assured GIPC of their unwavering support and their feedback to help draft a final document for validation before it is rolled-out.

RHODALINE ABBA

MLGDRD, PR