Dr Sam Onyia is State Team Lead (STL) of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) State to State Project in Ebonyi. In this interview with WISON OKEREKE, he says strict implementation of the development plan his agency is putting together will improve governance in the state. He spoke also on various development issues.
What is the mandate of your office?
We are a development agency who are supporting the government to serve the citizenry better and the ongoing project is a governance programme which operates in six states of the federation: Akwa Ibom, Adamawa, Bauchi, Ebonyi, Gombe and Sokoto, so the service is mainly to support governance in the selected states and it is done in collaboration with some key stakeholders in government, some civil society organisations (CSOs) and other important groups like the private sector, market women, people living with disabilities among others.
Our stakeholders cut across all strata of the society and what we do is anchored on three sub purposes which lie on prudence in public financial management in the state, public procurement system, monitoring and evaluation. In the first sub purpose, the three priority sectors are: Primary Healthcare, Basic Education and Water Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) and public financial management. If the public resources are well managed and channelled the way it ought to be, it will translate to true service delivery which means that the people’s welfare is taken care of.
In sub purpose 2, this has to do with building the capacity of CSOs, the government and the citizens to achieve a better society. It will provide an opportunity for citizens and CSOs to be engaged in governance because when the two arms are properly engaged, the government will be able to be attending to their needs appropriately. It is a way of ensuring that both the supply and demand sides come together. The supply side comes from the government that holds the resources in trust for the citizens and on the part of the demand; the citizens demand accountability.
This particular purpose will help to get the people involved in the activities of government and when that happens, improved service delivery will be seen because the governance will focus on the core needs of the people. Once the inputs of all the stakeholders are implemented, for instance during budgets preparation, government officials will be at a particular place and begin to guess what shall be the people’s needs as their needs will be prioritized with the project.
With this plan, every policy will always address the needs of the people while its implementation should be the instrumentality of budgeting to enable people feel the impact of true service delivery.
The sub purpose 3 centres on conflict management and our target is to build capacity of CSOs and other stakeholders to manage conflict. It is not about litigation, rather it is about reconciliation and the programme is for the government and the communities so that they can manage the issue of conflict adequately as the problem has to do with waste of resources. Therefore, if conflict is dictated, it should be handled on time because good governance cannot excel in a conflict laden land since the government’s mandate is to protect lives and property. And on this note, when crisis is noticed, it has to be tackled first. This is why we are helping the government by building the capacity of the communities to understand the dynamics of conflicts in their particular contexts because there is tendency that the conflict in Ebonyi will differ from that of Sokoto State.
How did you choose the targeted states?
Every programme uses objective criteria to select states where it will operate, it is usually evidence based, these states were selected based on objective criteria, objective assessment and objective indices, whether economical, socially, developmental or otherwise. And concerning the ongoing project in Ebonyi, we are at the stage of consultation on state development being the strategic plan of the state which articulates visions and the aspirations of Ebonyi people. It is in view of this that the consultation is wide and all-inclusive.
The programme is in that way because we want to get the interest of every party starting from ward to state levels. Even before we got to this consultation stage, we had done the first phase which involved all the 171 political wards in the state. Then each ward came with its councillor and town union president. Thereafter, we went into council areas and state levels consultations where all the stakeholders made their inputs. Presently, what is going on is the completion of the process. We are trying to tidy up everything. That is why we have some consultants among us. And after this stage, we shall use the inputs to articulate a development plan for Ebonyi people since it is the people’s wish.
What will be the duration of the plan?
All our plans have time range; some 10 years, 15 years or thereabouts. But the development plan in Ebonyi will last for 25 years which means that till that period, there will be a roadmap for strategic development and quality governance in the state. As the event keeps unfolding either politically or otherwise, the government is already with the compass which will take its officials to where they want to be. This is the essence of the development plan. It is a critical document which will ever remain a blueprint for other subsequent administrations.
USAID State To State project is helping the government over the document for sustainable transformation and development of Ebonyi State. If it is well implemented, once the consultations are concluded, the consultants will go back and begin to put all inputs together that will touch all aspects of the economy. The information will be sector by sector. It will equally serve for socio-economic development which will be used to transform the state.
Is there a memorandum of understanding between the government and your agency to ensure that the plan is implemented?
It is not necessary because the state government through Governor David Umahi has bought into the programme, setting up a steering committee to be headed by his deputy and a technical committee with the Commissioner for Finance as the head. So the government is already part of the project.
How sure are you that the plan will be sustained by subsequent administrations since there is no legal backing yet?
Government is a continuum, and no administration will want to ignore the plan capable of improving its leadership. Whoever that comes in and finds out the processes which the document passed through, the person will definitely uphold the plan. I want to assure you that the plan is a living document that may not require enactment of law for either its implementation or sustainability, it can be reviewed but the most important thing is to focus on the people’s needs. It can also be used to monitor, evaluate and assess the progress in every sector.