Sierra Leone calls on Minister of Rural Development

The Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, Mr Kwadwo Adjei-Darko, has called on governments and institutions in West Africa to strength relationships and share experiences.

Mr Adjei-Darko made the remarks when a 16-member delegation from Sierra Leone on study tour to some government institutions paid a courtesy call on him on Monday.

The delegation represents both governmental and non-governmental institutions in Sierra Leone working on fiscal decentralisation.

He said Sierra Leone and other countries in the sub-region now implementing decentralisation need not ''reinvent the wheel'' and that Ghana will place its rich experiences in decentralisation at the disposal of all. Mr Adjei-Darko briefed the delegation on Ghana's system of decentralisation and local governance.

He said the country has moved a little bit forward, since 1988 when decentralisation was introduced

The Leader of the Sierra Leonean delegation, Mr Edmund Koroma, Director of Economic Policy and Research of the Ministry of Finance, said, in 1989, the country implemented economic decentralisation that combined the adoption of a free market economy and integration into the market place.

He added that there were two key planks in fiscal decentralisation that the delegation would like to harness, using the Ghanaian experience in the areas of the legal environment and functions of local government.