IDEG Confident Election Of MMDCEs Won't Be Sabotaged

The Institute for Democratic Governance (IDEG), has allayed fears of possible sabotage if the election of Metropolitan, Municipal or (District Chief Executives) in the country, becomes a reality.

At a seminar with officials of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP), IDEG made a strong case for active partisan involvement in local governance which focuses on development.

The Executive Director of IDEG, Dr. Emmanuel Akwetey, also urged government to adopt what he termed as the mixed member proportional representation to encourage more women representation, and marginally deprived within the country's local governance system.

“We think that if the assemblies are going to be elected, how we would strengthen women's representation, how we would strengthen youth, disability and other marginal groups including even that epic minority, if there are situations like that. So let's do the first past the post, but let's also introduce mixed member proportional representation,” he said.

Debate over MMDCEs election
The debate of election of MMDCEs has lingered for some time, with some Ghanaians looking forward to its implementation.

The proposal has received varied views from analysts in the field of local governance.

Whereas some have complained that the country’s local governance system risk sabotage if MMDCEs are elected, others think otherwise.

The fear of sabotage stems from the fact that, an MCE could be elected from an opposition party, whereas the Central government will be controlled by another party.

The suggestion is that, such an MCE may be sabotaged by central government, by way of they refusing to allocate the necessary resources to him or her to achieve the Assembly’s set objectives.

NPP promises to make it possible
The New Patriotic Party (NPP) in its 2016 manifesto, promised to “oversee the direct election of Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives (MMDCEs) within 24 months of election into office, to coincide with the next District Assembly elections in 2019.”

This was reaffirmed by the President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo who promised that “In 2018, we are going to move to fully elected District Assembly representations including the choice of the District chief Executive (DCE). It is going to be done by the people of the districts and no longer by the nomination of the President.”