Residents of Monyupelle Community in the Nandom District have appealed to government to release the District Assemblies Common Fund (DACF) to enable the various Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies to carry out development projects.

The residents said the community borehole had broken down for some time now and there is no access to potable water more so it was also not connected to the national electricity grid to help boost cottage industry and enhance livelihoods.

At a social accountability forum held at Monyupelle recently, the residents said they have been paying the taxes required to the assembly but lacked basic social facilities in the community.

“Taxes paid to the Nandom District Assembly have not benefited us as expected. Anytime we went to the Nandom District Assembly to put our demands across, we are always told there is no money in the Assembly’s coffers’ to implement projects”, the residents said.

The participants said the situation was worrying as it is discouraging residents from responding appropriately to their tax obligations because they felt the assembly was not adequately providing the needed development projects to enhance livelihoods.

They said many of the assemblies depended on the Common Fund to implement development projects and any delay on the part of government to release money to the assemblies could have a rippling effect on rural development and the welfare of the people.

Mr William Safo Mumuni, Assistant Director at the Nandom District Assembly, in response to the concerns of the residents, said the Assembly got its share of the last release of the District Development Fund in 2013 and that out of the GHC 108,000.00 budgeted for this year only GHC 45,000.00 has been raised as at September.

He said the assembly had taken notice of all the development challenges in the communities and factored them into the Mid Term Development Plan of the assembly to be addressed.

Mr Mumuni appealed to people in the district to pay their taxes regularly and promptly to enable the assembly to raise more revenue to undertake development project in the communities.

The Ghana Centre for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana) a civil society organisation through Partnership for Rural Development Action (PRUDA) also a local nongovernmental organisation is implementing the project with funding from Open Society for Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA).

The project is designed by CDD-Ghana, OSIWA and Nandom District Assembly to ensure that citizens began to build a more productive partnership with the assembly and provide feedback and opinions on projects and social service delivery to the assembly so that the assembly could take action and improve service delivery, especially education, health, and sanitation among others.

It is also to make known the programmes and activities of the assembly, and what projects the assembly planned to implement as well as its finances to the citizens.

PRUDA is implementing the project in the Nandom District and it is supporting and disseminating information on promoting social accountability through citizens participation in local governance.