APRM OVERSIGHT COMMITTEES INAUGURATED (PAGE 16)

AFRICAN Peer Review Mechanism (APRM) Oversight Committees for the Tamale, Tolon-Kumbungu and Savelugu-Nanton districts have been inaugurated in Tamale, with a call on district assemblies to be more proactive towards the implementation of the APRM to further deepen democracy at the grass roots.
The committees, with nine members each, have been tasked with the responsibility of monitoring and evaluating the implementation of the APRM in the three districts to help address some of the shortfalls and weaknesses identified in the country’s self assessment reports.
So far, 88 of such committees have been inaugurated nationwide under the auspices of the National African Peer Review Mechanism Governing Council (NAPRM-GC).
The Executive Secretary of the NAPRM-GC, Dr Francis Appiah, in an interview with newsmen, stressed the need for the members of the committee to sensitise people in their respective communities to the APRM.
Touching on the sustainability of the APRM in communities, Dr Appiah noted that the committees would be expected to administer questionnaires, collate them, analyse them and present them to their respective communities for validation every six months.
He further explained that the committees would also produce a progress report to be presented to the President for submission to the African Union (AU).
Dr Appiah intimated that “the committees would participate in regional and national validation processes depending on the extent of freedom enjoyed by the people at the grass roots vis-à-vis the extent to which the rule of law is working in the communities”.
“In other words the critical role of the committees is to give democracy full meaning in terms of its content and not just the rhetoric” he explained.
According to him, it would be unfair and improper for “us to sit in Accra and judge what is going on in the districts that have the committees”.
The Chairman of the NAPRM, Rev. Professor Samuel Adjepong, observed that the APRM was “a people centered process that is to promote a sense of ownership among the various communities”.
“Essentially, the committees would be involved in the education of the people in the district on the APRM as applied in Ghana”Rev Prof. Adjepong stressed.
The Public Affairs Officer of the NAPRM-GC, Mrs Cornelia Amoah, for her part stated that it was a policy that four out of the nine-member committee for each of the district should include women as a way of ensuring gender parity in the composition of the committees.