Community Action for Popular Participation, an NGO, has urged Ministries, Departments and Agencies in Plateau State to give high premium to the social needs of communities in their development plans.
Nelson Ananze, the Acting Executive Director of the organisation, gave the advice at a State Level High Policy Dialogue on Community Development Charter it organised on Saturday in Jos.
According to Ananze, the dialogue is to present a document on the needs of some of the communities in the state that his organisation had already developed for the various MDAs in the state for further action.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that CAPP has been working in 18 communities in six local government areas of the state.
The acting executive director explained that the forum would also help the MDAs to plan well and assign projects in accordance with the priority needs of benefiting communities.
Ananze said: “The essence of this dialogue is to intimate and present a document on needs of some of the communities we are working in.
“We went into the communities and identified some of their challenges which we documented and we want to present them today to the various MDAs to see how they can infuse them in their policy plans and budgets.
“This will go a long way to help MDAs to know the needs of the communities so as to be in the know of the areas that needs serious and urgent attention and the ones that can come under their long term plans.
“This will also benefit the communities because there are various social needs which are left unattended to; so this kind of engagement gives opportunity to the communities to tell government what their immediate needs are.
“Government should not just allocate projects to communities because these communities have myriad of challenges, but there are priorities that needs urgent attention.
“For instance, if the immediate need of a community is water, and government decide to construct road for them, they may not appreciate as they would if it is water that is provided.”
In a paper titled: “Role of Government of MDAs in Bringing Development to the Communities,” Steve Aluko, a public affairs commentator, said strong government structures are essential ingredients of promoting development and growth at the rural areas.
Aluko said the constitution of Nigeria provides that the social well being of the people must be the first priority of any government, hence strong MDAs would be needed for equitable and fair distribution of resources.
He said: “Essentially, the ingredients we need to promote development and growth at the rural levels is a strong institution of governance.
“The MDAs plays significant role in information gathering, policy formulation and allocation of resources, and how progressive they play their role reflects on what we get at the community level.
“So, when a government has functional MDAs, at the end of the day it reflects positively in the lives of communities because they will be able serve as feedback mechanism between government and the people.”
NAN reports that the event, organised under the project: “Strengthening Citizen’s Engagement in Electoral Processes,” was supported by Actionaid Nigeria, BBC Media Trust and UKaid.
—
Follow The Eagle Online Channel on WhatsApp
