That will require that the MDCEs come up with innovative ways and interventions towards creating decent jobs to improve the living standards of the people.

The Upper East Regional Minister, Stephen Yakubu, said this at the signing of performance contracts with the 15 MDCEs and Coordinating Directors in the region at the conference hall of the Regional Coordinating Council last Monday.

“At the local level, we can create many jobs for the people to take advantage of to better their lives and that of their families instead of waiting for formal or non-existent white-collar jobs,” he said.

The contract to be fulfilled by the MDCEs and Coordinating Directors centres on seven thematic areas, namely general administration, human resource management, financial management and reporting and infrastructural development. The rest are social services delivery, economic development and environmental and sanitation management.

Generating wealth

Mr Yakubu said the problems in the region were not just about building classroom blocks, toilets and other social amenities but how MDAs could change ways to generate wealth in the various localities.

“I am not oblivious of how difficult it is to create jobs locally but with innovations and new ways of doing things and the needed commitment, it can be done so easily for the ultimate benefit of the many unemployed youth,” he said.

“Let us consciously create small jobs for the local people since they are not looking for first and second degree jobs but rather jobs that can also help MDAs generate local revenue from them,” he indicated.

Mr Yakubu said performance agreement had come to stay in the public service as a means of eliciting accountability from duty bearers.

On financial management, he admonished MDAs to comply with prudent financial management regulations to avoid unnecessary audit queries, adding that “reading through your audit reports, I couldn’t believe what I saw as some of the findings were very bad”.

“Let us do our best in responding to audit observations timeously and diligently to save the image of MDAs in the region,” he said.

Other speakers

For his part, the Dean of the MDCEs, Daniel K. Gariba, who is the District Chief Executive for Builsa South, on behalf of his colleagues, pledged to work to ensure that all details in the contract were followed and implemented for the benefit of the people.

He urged the minister to pay unannounced visits to the MDAs to monitor the implementation of the contract and to keep the assemblies on their toes.