Friends of the Nation (FoN), with support from Oxfam, has held a day’s stakeholder forum on mineral revenue management for stakeholders in the Wassa Amenfi East Municipality.
Speaking at the event which took place at Wassa Akropong, Nana Efua Ewur, Monitoring and Evaluation Coordinator for FoN, said the forum aimed to empower some selected stakeholders to have in-depth knowledge of mineral revenue management.
She said participants would be able to monitor how mineral revenues were spent at the sub-national level and use results to influence government spending priorities on public services such as education, health, rural development, social protection and agriculture.
“The Mineral Development Fund (MDF) is supposed to develop communities hosting mining operations but we have noticed most citizens in these areas are not aware of such fund so we want to create awareness so that they can assist to ensure its use for the intended purpose,” She explained.
Nana Ewur stated that during Town hall meetings, the Assemblies’ should indicate the source of funding for each project they had implemented in their presentation to the public, adding that, this would enable the citizens to monitor the activities of the assembly closely.
She said although this was their first engagement in the Wassa Amenfi East Municipality, they would be having radio programmes to educate the community on MDF and also train the youth on how to monitor the MDF the Assembly received and how they utilize it.
She indicated that FoN would continue to provide capacity building to residents in mining communities on the MDF to achieve the objective for which it was established.
Commenting on the programme, Mr Benjamin Owusu, Assistant Planning Officer for Wassa Amenfi East Municipal Assembly, commended FoN and said the forum had come in good time.
He said the assembly would always render accounts to the citizens of Wassa Amenfi East Municipality and ensure transparency in their governance system.
