Mr Kwasi Boateng Adjei, the Deputy Minister of Local Government, has bemoaned the low revenue generated by the metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies (MMDAs) and urged them to up their efforts.

He said the top hierarchy of the MMDAs must show commitment to investing in revenue mobilisation and called on the chief executives and other top management to prioritise and actively invest their time and resources in it.

Mr Adjei made the call when he paid a working visit to the Tax Revenue for Economic Enhancement (TREE) Project Office in Cape Coast.

The Netherlands Government, through the TREE Project, has automated revenue mobilisation in the 16 selected MMDAs in the Central and Western regions.

It will be replicated later in the various MMDAs across the country based on the success of the pilot project.

The Minister further underscored the need for citizens’ engagement, transparency and social accountability in the management of the assemblies’ fund for enhanced performance and accountability.

“If citizens know why they should pay their levies and see what the monies they are paying are being used for, they will voluntarily honour their tax obligations,” he said, and lauded the TREE Project for its contribution to improving revenue mobilisation in the assemblies.

“We want to see quantum increment in revenue of the assemblies. With this impressive contribution of the TREE Project in the improvement of the revenue database of the assemblies, I expect all MMDAs to take advantage of the situation to quadruple their revenue by the end of the year.”

Mr Adjei said plans were advanced to expand the concept and good practices of the TREE Project to other MMDAs.

He, therefore, urged key staffs of the beneficiary MMDAs to be actively involved in the activities to ensure smooth transfer of knowledge from the experts to the assemblies.

Mr Bless Kwame Darkey, the TREE Project Coordinator, said it had introduced a new concept to the beneficiary assemblies to enhance service delivery to the public.

Dubbed; “Electoral Area Small Project” (EASP), the concept ensured that a percentage (preferably 20 per cent) of the revenue generated in each electoral area was re-invested into a small-scale project in the area.

He announced that the Cape Coast Metropolitan Assembly (CCMA) had already taken the initiative by opening a special account in which the EASP money would be deposited for development.

He expressed the hope that the initiative, coupled with the e-billing and e-payment, which the project intended to introduce, would help block leakages in the revenue mobilisation of the assemblies.

Mr Ebow Mensah, the Finance Officer of the CCMA, said the state-of-the-art technology employed by the TREE Project had helped the Metropolis to double its revenue data.

Some MMDAs present expressed satisfaction about the activities of the Project and hoped that it would help to significantly improve their revenue mobilisation base.