USAID seeks citizen participation in governance
United States Agency for International Development (USAID), has urged for more participation of Gombe youths, women and physically challenge in issues of governance.
Speaking shortly after a Citizens’ Accountability Report (CAR), organised by Responsible Citizenship and Human Development Initiative (RCHDI), for people of Gombe South, USAID Local Government Manager State2State Activity Zariyatu Abubakar, stressed the need for more citizens to get involved.
Recall that State Accountability, Transparency and Effectiveness activity State2State is a USAID funded project implemented by DAI Global in six (6) states of Nigeria including Adamawa, Akwa Ibom, Bauchi, Ebonyi, Sokoto and Gombe.
The activity has interest in three key sectors of Primary Healthcare, Basic Education and WASH; Water Sanitation and Hygiene.
According to her, there should be a constant forum where citizens could talk and prioritise their problems based on the needs of the whole community, adding that it is achieved through public finance management, citizens engagement and conflict mitigation.
Abubakar said, “Citizens should make it part of their business to have interest in what the government is doing and to also look inwards by factoring their communities to know what they need. It should be a consensus of the entire community. Secondly, channeling the needs properly is important, they should know the timing of channeling their demands, when the budget process starts then you can make the needed input and it will translate into results.
“We hope to see a lot of involvement in looking at the document that the government has been publishing, like the budget document, there is citizens budget document which is easy for the layman to understand, the 10 year development plan of Gombe State, there is also the abridged form much smaller than the bulky one. They should make the business of governance their business. we the citizens are the government so, the the need to monitor and give feedback to the government then we can see effectiveness in governance.”
While emphasizing on the essence of participation, the USAID Local Government Manager State2State, said with the dwindling resources at government disposal governance would be more result driven.
“Now citizens are becoming involved in governance, they know what the dividends of democracy should be and how governance should move. This translates into effectiveness in service delivery, there will be judicious use of dwindling resources and So, because of the dwindling resources there is need for government to be deliberate in their activities to ensure whatever little resources is used to the optimum,” Abubakar added.
Also speaking, Hassan Abdu, Chief Budget Officer, who represented Director Budget, Planning and Development Partners Coordination, Abubakar Geidam said Citizens’ Account Report fosters understanding.
Geidam added, “It contributes to the effort of increasing government accountability on how how it manges public money as well as foster understanding of how public funds are utilized, especially if the information is presented in an accessible format.”
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