Out of the 21 Duapa Award winning Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs), 17 have met the minimum condition for the second stage (Dignified City Award) of the Sanitation Challenge for Ghana (SC4Gh). The 17 MMDAs have therefore qualified and are vying for the Dignified City Award of the SC4Gh, which has a total prize purse of GBP 1.285.
These were some of the key highlights of the SC4Gh stage 2 inception workshop of September 15, 2016, which was organised by the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development (MLGRD) in collaboration with IRC, Maple Consults and IMC World Wide with the support of UK Department for International Development (DFID). The start-up workshop, under the theme, Inducing MMDAs to transform urban sanitation services through liquid waste management strategy implementation, was designed to enable the 17 MMDAs and partners reflect on Stage 1 of the SC4Gh; but also make MMDAs familiar with the stage 2 processes and activities.
The 3-fold inception workshop, opened by Mr. Andrew Osei, the Deputy Minister for Ashanti Region of Ghana, reflected and discussed a range of issues including the eligibility criteria for stage 2, the prize package, the judging process, criteria and indicators for assessment; baseline and end line verification processes, expectations and timelines, among others.
The participating 17 MMDAs were confirmed to have responded to MLGRD questionnaire and satisfied the required minimum conditions for stage 2. These MMDAs comprise 3 metropolitan assemblies, 6 municipal assemblies and 8 district assemblies, namely,
- Sekondi Takoradi Metropolitan Assembly, Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly, and Accra Metropolitan Assembly;
- Awutu Senya East Municipal Assembly, Effutu Municipality, Ejisu Juaben Municipal Assembly, Kassena Nankana Municipal Assembly, Mampong Municipal Assembly, and Savelugu-Nanton Municipal Assembly; and
- Ahanta West District Assembly, Atiwa District Assembly, Jasikan District Assembly, Kwahu East District Assembly, Nanumba North District Assembly, Offinso North District Assembly, Prestea HuniValley District Assembly, and Pru District Assembly.
Facilitating the workshop, Vida Duti, IRC Ghana Director and Team Leader of the Local Implementing Agent stated, “The Dignified City Award (2nd stage) of the SC4Gh competition focuses on implementation of the selected liquid waste management strategies. We wish to congratulate the 17 MMDAs for making it to this stage, and more importantly participating in the inception workshop. We hope the high level of interest and enthusiasm demonstrated so far will be sustained throughout the two-and-half year prize period (June 2016 – November 2018). Once again we will like to reaffirm our continued commitment to work hard together with Government to make Ghana a dignified place, and sanitation for all a reality”.
The workshop, which recorded over 90 participants including district chief executives, representatives from the ministry of finance, the private sector; non-governmental organisations and academia generated excitement and high impressions. The level of participation, quality of facilitation and presentations, and the depth of interventions and interactions were highly commended. Mr. Mawuena Dotse of MAPLE Consult and Technical Advisor to SC4Gh, like many participants could not hide his excitement and had this to say
“This has been one of the best workshops organised by the SC4Gh team – Best in terms of the numbers – relatively small but compact; the fact that for the first time in many years, MMDAs fully sponsored themselves to the workshop with no expectation of any refund; the high representation of chief executives; the workshop facilitation; the delivery of the deputy minister for the Ashanti Region; the representative from the fiscal decentralisation unit of the Ministry of Finance; the private sector and academia. In the nutshell, I think that the MMDAs are geared to work towards the implementation of phase 2. We hope to have a very successful adaptive learning project in collaboration with all the relevant stake holders”
The process leading to the inception workshop followed the launch of the Dignified City Award by Hon. Alhaji Collins Dauda, the Minister of Local Government and Rural Development (MLGRD) on 22nd June 2016; the twenty one (21) prequalified MMDAs were invited by MLGRD to express their intention to participate in the second stage of the competition. At the close of the deadline, 17 MMDAs responded and met the minimum condition and were invited together with partners to the stage 2 start-up workshop.
With the high impressions and momentum generated by the stage 2 inception workshop, the 17 MMDAs are geared-up to work towards the full implementation of their liquid waste management strategies in a bid to attain dignified city status, and also merit the reward of excellence. In the coming months towards the first monitoring visit by the SC4Gh team, it is envisaged that MMDAs will embark on a lot of activities to demonstrate commitment and excellence. At this stage the SC4Gh team expects all-inclusive partnerships towards a successful adaptive learning initiative.