Governance

The District Chief Executive is the political and administrative head of the Assembly. He is the chairman of the Executive Committee of the District Assembly and he presides at the meetings of the executive, he superintends the administrative functions of the Assembly and the supervision of its various departments.

The Executive Committee exercises the executive and co-ordinating functions of the District Assembly. The functions of the committee include:

• Co-ordinating plans and programmes of the sub-committees and submitting these as comprehensive plans of action to the District Assembly.

• Overseeing the administration of the district in collaboration with the office of the District Chief Executive

• Integrating and co-ordinating the process of planning, programming, budgeting and implementation

• Recommending to the District Assembly, the economic, social and human settlement policies relating to the development of the district

• Monitoring and evaluating all policies, programmes and projects in the district

The sub-committees available in Tain District include Finance and Administration, Works, Social Services, Development Planning, Justice and Security, Agric, Women and Children; and Public Complaints. Every sub-committee is responsible for collating and deliberating on issues relevant to it and it shall submit its recommendations to the Executive Committee of the Assembly. The newly sworn in Assembly members are 52, comprising 49 males and 3 females. The existing organizational structure (organogram) of the Tain District Assembly is shown in the figure below.

There are 6 Area councils and 1 Town Council (Badu) in the District and all are duly constituted. The six(6) Area Councils are Kyekyewere, Nsawkaw, Bepoase, Menji, Debibi and Seikwa.

One area that the District Assembly can be commended for is organisation of public forum for fee-fixing and budget validation. Stakeholders are invited annually at the meeting to solicit their views and opinions on the fees charged them. Annually, at least one fee-fixing forum is organised for such a purpose. However, when it comes to composite budget approval, the assembly members who represent the local people approbate the budget.

Pasting Information on notice board is one avenue people can participate and be aware of the activities of the District Assembly. The Tain District Assembly on regular basis ensures that information is pasted on the notice boards for awareness creation. However, notice boards are only sited at the office of the District Assembly which makes accessibility very limited. Information on jobs, appointments, procurement awards and other important announcements are made for public intake.

The law enjoins stakeholders to participate in monitoring exercises of the District Assembly. This is in the form of quarterly development sites visits to monitor progress of developmental projects. As far as possible, traditional authorities, assembly members, religious group leaders, NGOs and other youth groups are made to participate in some of these quarterly activities.

Public hearings are also organised at least twice during the preparation of District Medium Term Plans. This affords opportunities for the citizens to validate what is captured in the plan and be aware of the interventions they likely would benefit within the four-year implementation of the plan.

Institutional capacity needs

The DPCU which has the mandate to plan, monitor and evaluate interventions is fully equipped in terms of human resource to discharge its mandate. In terms of qualification and staff compliment, the DPCU is fully composed and all staff has the required education to discharge their operations effectively. In recent past, most of the Decentralised Departments were staying in rented premises, but with the extra effort of the District Chief Executive, the Office complex which had delayed for years is now housing all the Departments.

The Planning Unit which serves as the secretariat and documentation unit in terms of human resource, has two planning officers (1 development planning officer and an assistant development planning officer) and a secretary, and materially, has two laptops, a printer and scanner to undertake its planning functions.  However, there is no vehicle set aside for Monitoring purposes.

By the organisational structure of the District Assembly, the District Chief Executive who is the Political and Administrative Head is at the apex but she reports to the General Assembly headed by the Presiding Member, followed by the District Coordinating Director, who serves as the secretary to the DCE. Next in line are the various directors of the decentralised departments and other Agencies of the District Assembly and each of the Department has their unit heads following suit.

The following departments and agencies are there to ensure development in the District. They are the Central Administration; Finance Department; Works Department; Social Welfare and Community Development; Department of Agriculture; Department of Trade and Industry; Physical Planning; Department of Education, Youth and Sports; Disaster Prevention and Management, NCCE, VRA, Electoral Commission; Youth Enterprise Agency among others. The major challenge facing these departments is logistics and office equipment for them to fulfil their mandates.

The District Assembly can boast of a 2-storey office complex, comprising 47 offices and a 60-seater conference hall, which will be completed by the end of December, 2018.

The main essence of decentralisation is to ensure active participation by the citizens thereby bringing development to their doorsteps. It is the reason sub-district structures were established to mobilise the local people to take active role in the developmental discourse. However the Seven (7) Area/Town Councils are not fully operational in the District. Not all the sub-district structures have befitting offices.

As a result of the role sub-district structures play in the development process, there is therefore the need to strengthen them with accommodation, operational staff and logistical support.