Two ministers of state, in the past two weeks, have
lamented the lackadaisical attitude of Metropolitan, Municipal and District
Chief Executives (MMDCEs) towards official duties in the Northern and Upper
East Regions.
While the Northern Regional Minister, Salifu Saeed, was angry with the MMDCEs for absenting themselves from a meeting to discuss sanitation and hygiene issues, the Deputy Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, Collins Ntim, expressed his displeasure at MMDCEs, for arriving late at a programme with others not attending at all.
The two ministers did not hide their disappointment and told the chief executives that they were unhappy with their conduct.
Mr Saeed who was furious about the frequent lateness and absenteeism of some of the officials vowed to sanction them.
“I would no longer tolerate this behaviour of the MMDCEs anymore,” he said when only four out of 27 MMDCEs attended the Seventh League on Open Defecation Free (ODF) forum held in Tamale.
The minister subsequently ordered the MMDCEs who failed to attend the meeting to explain why they could not honour the invitation.
On his part, the Deputy Local Government Minister, was unhappy about the poor attendance of the officials at the launch of a new project; “The Ghana Productive Safety Net Project” in the Upper East Region, last Friday.
He expressed regret at the poor and late attendance of the chief executives at the launch of the new project meant to create jobs and alleviate poverty in deprived communities in the region.
Truth be told, poor and late attendance is a common practice in the country where many use the proverbial “Ghana time” to attend very important meetings.
Poor and late attendance at meetings is not peculiar to the MMDCEs but unfortunately, as leaders they ought to show the way rather than do what many are careless about.
The MMDCEs should not be the ones who fail to attend a programme that is geared towards improving the welfare of the people because their major responsibility is to bring about an improvement in the lives of their people.
The business of improving on the livelihood of the people must be their priority and for which they must always work for.
Although, we would resist the temptation of roundly condemning them for their lackadaisical attitude towards their official duties, we hope the admonition of the two ministers would be a wake-up call for them to change their attitudes.
They must lead by example in order to attract the cooperation of the citizenry for the collective good and sustainable development of the country.
