BEIJING – FROM NEW ERA NEWSPAPER

The Minister of Regional and Local Government, Housing and Rural Development (RLGHD), Jerry Ekandjo, says his ministry intends to establish its own technical directorate.

The envisioned technical directorate within the ministry will take a proactive role in rural development – as part of the ministry's functions under the decentralisation programme.

This need came to the fore as Ekandjo drew lessons from the Urban and Rural Development Policy of China, under which the Chinese Central Government plays a critical role in development matters of less developed provinces.

Planning for new infrastructure development, housing and economic growth are discussed at provincial government level and forwarded to central government for input.

In China, every province has a Communist Party of China Provincial Committee which is headed by a secretary. The Committee Secretary is first in charge of the province, rather than the governor of the provincial government and all have a direct link with Central Government.

Ekandjo sees the need for a technical directorate that will form part of an implementing agency that will be responsible for planning, mapping and surveying land for possible residential dwelling and future infrastructure development. He also points out that this will force various government agencies tasked with rural development to synchronize tasks easily.

The RLGHD Minister recently undertook a two-week observation tour in the provinces of Jiangsu and Guizhou in China. He noted that the greatest challenge facing the development of Namibia's rural areas is the self-authority of local authority governance, which disadvantage smaller and poorly resourced local authorities to compete with larger established local authorities.

Ekandjo's remarks come in the wake of a revised decentralization policy, which wants to fast-track rural development, but was in the past often compounded by a myriad of bureaucratic measures that mostly included funding.

A fortnight ago, Keetmanshoop Urban Councillor Hilma Nicanor said the Central Government should consider establishing a Constituency Development Fund (CDF), which could see funds meant for the development of constituencies being distributed directly to constituencies as opposed to sourcing funds through line ministries.

The present allocation of funds is allegedly a lengthy process that is often cumbersome and time-consuming.

Recently, the Standing Committee on Regional Development and Reports of the National Council tabled a motion calling for the establishment of CDF's in all 107 constituencies in an effort to streamline and fast-track the decentralization process.

Nicanor, on tabling the motion, said existing funding methods although governed by acts such as the Regional Council Act 22 of 1992, Local Authorities Act 23, the Decentralisation Enabling Act 33 of 2000 and the Trust Fund for Regional Development and Equity Provision Act 22 of 2000, are ineffective and have minimal impact on constituencies.

She said the Trust Fund for Regional Development and Equity Provision Act, which was set up to provide funding to the 13 geo-political regions, is heavily reliant on the transfer of funds from the Ministry of Regional and Local Government, Housing and Rural Development.

by John Ekongo,

New Era Newspaper