Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia wants Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies across the country to stop their over dependence on the central government for revenue to develop their assemblies.

Addressing participants at the 21st Biennial National Delegates Conference of NALAG in Kumasi, the Vice President said MMDAs must find innovative ways of generating revenue internally, than always waiting upon the government.

“Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies should move away from just providing essential services to becoming agents of development by harnessing all natural, material and human resources within their jurisdiction to bring the needed development, create jobs, reduce poverty, increase income levels and raise the needed internally generated funds to complement other sources of funding from central government,” the Vice President said.

Dr. Bawumia also urged the leadership and members of NALAG to work with all relevant state and non-state actors to ensure accelerated development at the local level of governance and also apply a mix of innovation, dialogue and collaboration with their peers to speed up the development process.

He also assured NALAG members and the participants of the government’s commitment to meeting the manpower needs of local authorities, with the expansion of the infrastructure of the Institute of Local Government Studies and the construction of a Local Government University at Akomadan in the Offinso North Municipality in Ashanti Region to augment the training capacity deficit we currently have.