North West Councils:

NW councils prioritize participatory dev’t

After signing co-financing partnership with the 34 councils in the North West region, the National Community Driven Development Programme, known by its French acronym as PNDP officially launched Phase III of its projects in the NW region on July 26, 2016.

                In a ceremony at the Bamenda Congress Hall presided at by the Governor of the North West Region, Adolf Lelel’Afrique, the National Coordinator of PNDP, Marie Madeline Nga and the  North West PNDP Coordinator Bruno Daniel Nkanjo drilled Mayors of the 34 councils who are the prime beneficiaries on the key components of Phase III of PNDP projects.

                A release from PNDP says Phase III of the project aims amongst other things at strengthening the capacity of councils in the management of public funds and in the participatory development process to guarantee the provision of quality socio economic infrastructure.  

                Speaking during the ceremony, the National Coordinator of PNDP, Marie Madeline Nga said thanks to the successful implementation of Phase I and II of their projects, “mayors are becoming increasingly aware and knowledgeable of the development of their communities and the management of bigger resources.

                She observed that given the many and varied challenges councils face to improve on the livelihoods of persons within their municipalities, Phase III of PNDP-Council partnership will seek to “construct socio-economic infrastructure, strengthen platforms of projects and programmes, working with the councils to ensure they get facilities provided by government and promoting local economy by valorising opportunities from decentralized cooperation”.

                Marie Madeline Nga noted that the Partnership will also improve the mobilization and security of all fiscal incomes through the use of SIMBA among other tools.

                “In addition, communities at the grassroots shall be mobilized to follow up, implement and maintain realized infrastructures, the organization said in a statement” she added.

                As an innovation of the third phase, she announced that “a performance account has been created to reward councils that would have distinguished themselves in all aspects to attain the objectives of PNDP”.

                According to a release from the organization, the key activities embedded in the co-financing partnership agreement are updates of councils’ development plans and elaboration of others, co-financing of council sessions extended to sector ministries, support to councils for the elaboration and financing of feasibility studies of micro projects and support to councils for the co-financing of the production of their quarterly magazine.

                Phase III of the PNDP-Council Partnership follows last February’s partnership agreement, which the Cameroon Ministry of Economy, Planning and Regional Development, MINEPAT signed with the World Bank in Yaounde.

                The third phase, launched last May 10 at National Level will support government policies and objectives in line with Growth and Employment Strategy and Decentralization Policy.