The Kassena Nankana East District Oversight Committee of the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), on Friday ranked the Ghana Police Service as the most corrupt institution, followed by
the Ghana Education Service (GES).
A validated research finding on Democracy and Good Governance, Economic Governance and Management and Corporate Governance in the district ranked the police 50 per cent on the corruption index and the GES 11 per cent,
followed by the Ghana Health Service with 10 per cent.
Touching on access to justice, about 55 per cent respondents said although justice was accessible to the people, some decisions by the
judiciary were unfair.
On the educational front, 67 per cent agreed that there has been improvement to education but 51 indicated that the delivering of quality
education was very low.
The finding also revealed that majority of people now has the ability to express themselves freely as compared to the past, but more men had the opportunity to do so than their women counterparts.
The report acknowledged that there has been some improvement in security matters at the district, especially with regards to arm robbery and access to electricity.
The Executive Secretary of the Governing Council of the National APRM, Dr Francis Appiah who addressed members of the committee, pointed out that Ghana was the pace setter of development in Africa due to good governance, which is in adherence to the APRM.
He indicated that Ghana had overtaken some pioneer countries of the
APRM.
Dr Appiah noted that it was against this background that the President
of the United States, Barack Obama and other renowned dignitaries often
chose to visit the country, emphasizing that Ghana had won international reputation because of its good governance practices.
He said notwithstanding the achievement chalked out, government and other stakeholders should not relent in their efforts to attain the
objectives of the APRM.
Ms Cornelia Amoah, Public Affairs Officer of the Governing Council of APRM, said 20 oversight committees had been formed by the council in 20
districts to periodically monitor and evaluate the activities of the decentralized system to ensure that they satisfied the needs of the people.
She noted that it would also help the communities to participate actively and contribute towards the development agenda.
Ms Amoah noted that committees have been trained on how to do proper monitoring and evaluation and said the APRM was nationalistic in character and not based on partisan politics.
She announced that there would be a national validation workshop in Accra that would prepare a document to be presented to the president for
submission at the African Union Summit.
The District Chief Executive, Mr. Emmanuel Andema commended the ARRM Secretariat and said it would facilitate efforts of the assembly in planning and executing its projects properly.
He presented a cash donation of 500 Ghana cedis on behalf Of the Assembly to support the activities of the APRM.