The Volta Regional Co-ordinating Council (VRCC) on Thursday, May 23, 2019 held a one-day workshop on the dissemination of Regional Planning and Co-ordinating Unit (RPCU) 2018 Fourth Quarter Monitoring Report and a symbolic handing over of monitoring data to officers of the Oti Region. The event was attended by both Hon. Ministers for the Volta and Oti Regions, Dr. Archibald Yao Letsa and Nana Kwasi Owusu Yeboah. Their Hon. Regional Deputies Ministers, Reverend Johnson Avuletey, and Maxwell Qophy Blagodzi, as well as the Chief Directors Mr Felix B. Chaahaah and Mr Andrews Okumah Nawil were also present.

Other participants included the Hon. Municipal and District Chief Executives and key officers from the eighteen (18) Assemblies and eight (8) Assemblies of the Volta and Oti Regions respectively.

In a welcome statement, Dr. Letsa indicated that it was important for the two regions to come together in order for the new region to know where it was starting from with regard to the performance of the Assemblies under the Oti Regional Co-ordinating Council (ORCC). He stated that the low performance of the Assemblies in the Oti Region was one of the key indication used as a justification for its creation.

He however revealed that in terms of the performance in health delivery, the Oti Region did better than the Volta Region.

On his part, the Hon. Regional Minister for the Oti Region, Nana Kwasi Owusu Yeboah intimated that the data being handed over to the ORCC would serve as vital information for the ORCC to kick start its monitoring activities. He assured the gathering that the Oti Region shall continue to collaborate with the Volta Region, and learn from its experiences.

He concluded that the natural resources in the Oti Region are enormous and needed to be harnessed. In light of this, the Region shall continue to rely on the Volta Region and the VRCC for expertise.

The monitoring report based on the following Assessment Criteria with other sub-indicators were presented by Mr Isaac Adza Tettey, the Regional Economic Planning Officer of the VRCC:

i. Planning

ii. Sanitation

iii. Administration

iv. Budgeting

v. Financial Management

Vi. Cross Cutting Issues

For the 5th consecutive time, since 2017 (4th Quarter), Hohoe Municipal Assembly placed First among the Twenty-five (25) Assemblies which were assessed in the Volta and Oti Regions.

The Rankings of the various Assemblies in the 4th Quarter of 2018 as against the 3rd Quarter are indicated in the table below:

Table1. Ranking of the 25 Assemblies (Source: Regional Planning and Co-ordinating Unit, VRCC)

After the presentation of the report, Dr. Archibald Yao Letsa presented two (2) soft copies of the data on Compact Discs to the Hon. Regional Minister for Oti Region, Nana Kwasi Owusu Yeboah .

It must be noted that the Co-ordinating Council is mandated under section189(c) of the Local Governance Act, 2016 Act 936 “to monitor, co-ordinate and evaluate the implementation of the programmes and projects of the District Planning Authorities within the region.

By Foster Huno

Public Relations Unit.