The Reform Agenda is intended to identify the human, institutional and process challenges confronting the Council in order to address them as a means to further empower KMC. It will constitute various changes and strengthening of various systems, processes, and tools as means to reinforcing the human and institutional capacity of the Council.
The Reform Agenda will serve to raise morale within the Council staff, restore public confidence and further institutionalize transparency, accountability, and efficiency to the entire management and operations of the Council. The following areas constitute the Reform Agenda.
- Revenue Collection: The new leadership will revamp or upgrade the current revenue collection system and units by developing proper tools and procedures to ensure effective checks and balances. Some of the new revenue collection measures will include payments through direct bank deposits aimed at reducing cash handling by collectors. This will minimize the tax evasion and corruption.
- Law Enforcement: The Municipal Police will be revived with new and expanded responsibilities such as the detection and prevention of crime, enforcement of such laws as covering anti-littering and public smoking laws, traffic citation among others. The Council will engage the line ministry for the proper implementation of these measures.
- Capacity Building: To ensure that the Council is efficient and effective and responsive to the needs of the municipality it has to have the necessary capacity. Hence a robust human and institutional capacity assessment and building will be embarked upon.
- Independence and Professionalism: One of the major challenges that have always beset the Council has been direct political interference. This malaise has served to undermine the management, operations, independence and professionalism of the Council hence its inability to fulfill its legal mandate to the people. Under our leadership, a robust reorientation of staffs and councilors will be undertaken to ensure that partisan political and other sectarian interferences are identified and discarded.
- Debt Collection: The Debt Collection Unit is one of the most important structures of the Council. Yet this unit has faced major challenges due to both political interference and corruption to ensure all debts accrued to the Council are collected. This unit will under a major restructuring and capacity development in order to effectively pursue defaulters to recoup debts.
- Financial Discipline: The Local Government Finance and Audit Act guide the management of the resources of the Council. The Act states that at least 60% of the funds of the Council must be invested in development programs for the municipality. It further states that when the estimates of the Council budget are drawn they must be posted in every ward for public scrutiny as a means to ensure transparency and accountability. The Act also calls for both internal and external audit and implementation of the recommendations therefrom. Over the years, this law has been ignored. But under our leadership, we will revert to the full utilization of this law as the center and foundation of Council’s management of resources.
- Public Works: One of the functions of the Council is to provide the necessary public infrastructure such as roads and other structures and their maintenance. This is under the purview of the Department of Development. Yet this department has been beset by a number of technical, financial and human resource challenges. For that matter, the department will be restructured to ensure efficiency. In addition, a Feeder Road Maintenance Unit will be created within the department. This unit whose creation is mandated by the Local Government Act will ensure that feeder roads within the municipality are kept motor-able at all times, especially during the rainy season.
- Waste Collection and Management: Probably the most contentious and challenging aspect of the work of the Council has been waste collection and management. This is certainly an expensive exercise in many respects among which include the vehicles, tools, and equipment as well as the dumping sites. The current state of affairs is untenable as the necessary resources are not adequate. Hence the Department of Community Service would require a major review in order to better position it to undertake this most important task of the Council.
Bakary’s plans to my mind are pragmatic. Am only bound to ask if what is printed here is the entire plan or a snippet. If this is the while thing, then he and his team have done a poor job of an in depth explanation of their vision and intentions.
One would expect an action plan on tackling the Bakoteh Dumpsite, hence Adama and his cabinet are incapable of solving any problem without resorting to constantly blaming Yaya and his bandits. A whole year spent blaming Yaya! Perhaps a mayor can beat the president at delivering to the people. Heyyyyyyy Kambi-Ya.
Yours in the service of The Gambia and Africa, I remain.