FEATURE25 June 2018

Accounting for change

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Katie McQuater

Features Impact Middle East and Africa Public Sector

In Ghana, public apathy meant citizens were not participating in government-development projects that affected them. A technology project, supported by Making All Voices Count, helped people monitor local government schemes and share their input. By Katie McQuater

Ghana-motorway

Ghana’s local governments were established to give people a voice to influence development policies and programmes in their area – but a low level of participation by the public meant their voices were not being heard and policy-makers were less accountable.

To tackle this, TransGov Ghana, a web and mobile application aggregating development projects for public monitoring, launched an initiative to help people keep track of – and offer feedback on – projects in their local area. 

“The aim was to give opportunities for Ghanaian citizens to influence public policies and programmes, and maintain general oversight of development projects to ensure accountability, value for money and greater impact on their lives and wellbeing, ” explains Jerry Akanyi-King, chief executive and co-founder of TransGov. 

“We believe that this is a critical requirement for sustaining democratic governance and promoting fundamental human rights in Ghana.”