'Be professional, diligent in determining contract costs' - Opoku

It was held on the theme: "The District Assemblies Common Fund as a catalyst for national development".

Mr Opoku asked all district assemblies to strictly go by the guidelines for the utilisation of the fund and ensure that it was actually used for the purposes stipulated in the guidelines.

He cited the example of the concerns being raised that contract sums for projects were usually inflated,  thereby denying the people the full benefit of the fund.

Mr Opoku called on the assemblies to adopt measures to curb malpractices in the drawing of plans, budgets and awards of contracts to ensure the judicious use of DACF.

In his remark, the Administrator of the DACF, Mr Kojo Fynn, said the demands his office received daily meant that the current seven-and-half per cent of the total national revenue paid into the fund for distribution to the district assemblies was not enough.

He,therefore called for part of the oil revenue to be paid into the fund to increase the fund and promised to put the case across at the Cabinet level.

Mr Fynn revealed that the total budget allocation for the DACF this year is GH¢1,130 million, out of which GH¢319 million had been set aside for the Priority Intervention Programme (PIPs).

The PIPs include GH¢60 million for National Sanitation Programme; GH¢30 million for sanitation guards;  GH¢30 million for sanitation and waste management and GH¢199 million for the School Feeding Programme.

The Deputy Minority Whip and MP for Sunyani West, Mr Ignatius Baffuor Awuah, who represented the Minority Leader, Mr Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, said the law establishing the fund stipulated that a percentage of total national revenue, which he said included revenue from oil, should be paid into the fund.

He add that even though Parliament approved an amount to paid into the DACF every year, there was the need for the House to be furnished with the actual amount paid into fund at the end of the day.

Participants expressed concern about the tension between DCEs and MPs over the use of the MPs’ share of the Common Fund,and said the issue was detrimental to the welfare of the people.

In his address, the Dean of the Parliamentary Press Corps urged MMDCEs to cultivate the habit of consulting traditional authorities and people in their catchment areas before the siting of projects in order to derive the maximum benefits from such projects.

He also called for the increase in the total national revenue allocated to the DACF to make more funds available to the district assemblies to undertake development projects.

Story by Emmanuel Adu-Gyamerah