A non-governmental organization (NGO), Civil Rights Concern has advised the Anambra State House of Assembly to be more proactive in their primary responsibilities of lawmaking, oversight function and adequate representation were carried out diligently to the benefit of their constituents.
The Rights group under the aegis of Voice to the People (V2P), saddled with the mission of monitoring and evaluating the level of impact of the government policies and programmes to the citizens, according to its coordinator Mr. Okey Onyeka said that there was a huge gap between the government and her policies to the citizens of the state.
He cited 2015 budget implementation as something that did not have any positive effects to the living standard of the people especially Health and Agriculture.
He noted that the 2015 budget performance of in the health sector, which was about 10.5% shows that a number of projects started in respect of renovation in general hospitals, Primary Health Centers (PHC) did not attack the lack of availability and accessibility to health facilities.
He however, advised the state government to bridge the gaps in the budget and the actual implementation.
This, according to him, has exposed many people in the state to high vulnerability and poverty, especially the farmers in the rural areas.
“State government should be proactive in allocation and implementing greater percentage of her budget to health sector and Agriculture, as both were inevitable to the survival of people in the society. Virtually all the previous year’s budget have failed in these aspect”, he said.
He urged the Anambra State lawmakers to ensure that what happened in the previous years in budgetary allocation and implementation did not repeat itself in 2017 budget, recently presented by Governor Willie of Obiano to the House.
“Lawmakers should purse those people-oriented bills, promoting good governance and accountability, play the role of watchdog through constant monitoring of government activities (oversight function)”, Onyeka said.
The rights group Coordinator who attributed the low performance and denial of dividend of democracy on the part of political office holders as a result of lack of monitoring and confrontation by the appropriate stakeholders such as civil society, media and corporate bodies, calls on the masses, especially Civil Society and media to rise and take bold step in confronting the leaders for accountability.
He however, insisted that the Civil Society Organisation and media should engage legislature in order to identify the political constraint, opportunity, inspire support for an issue or action and raise new idea or question the old ones.
In his response, the Deputy Speaker, Anambra State House of Assembly, Rt. Honourable Harford Oseke, representing Awka South II constituency thanked the group for their concern and promised that the House members would leave no stone unturned in ensuring that 2017 budget is people’s oriented and beneficial to all.
From Christian Chime, Onitsha