Madam Mabel Amoako-Atta, Director, Office of the Head of the Local Government Service has said they have developed and was implementing an evaluation and assessment system to improve institutional, staff capacity, competition, performance and service delivery.

The assessment dubbed "Local Government Service Performance Management Systems" (PMS) consist of Performance Contract for Regional Ministers, Regional Coordinating Directors, District Chief executives and coordinating directors at the district levels.

Madam Amoako-Atta at the Pre-launch of the 2017 District League Table (DLT) in the Western Region said the DLT was therefore a key tool for the selection of indicators for the PMS by highlighting the challenges of the various districts through the assessment.

The DLT is a joint initiative by CDD-Ghana and UNICEF-Ghana implemented in collaboration with the Ministry of Local Government and the Office of the Head Local Government Services.

It seeks to assess, compare and measure the level of development of all the 216 MMDAs in the country with indicators such as health, neonatal care, education, rural water, governance, sanitation and security.

She said the local government service recognised the DLT as an objective assessment with the potential to engender competition among the MMDAs, stimulate district level performance and further deepen efforts at decentralisation.

Madam Amoako-Atta said since its inception in 2014, the DLT continued to be a significant national tool for raising awareness of district development and promoting social accountability at the local level as well as improving responsiveness in service delivery.

She added that the citizenry were becoming more sophisticated and discerning in their expectations and quest for services from state actors and that such actors must have reliable information and data to plan and implement interventions to meet the demands of the citizenry.

She therefore urged all Regional Coordinating Councils and MMDAs as well as other stakeholders to effectively participate in the DLT arrangement and use the resultant rankings and data to promote improved services to the people.

Mr. Rexford Asiama, Research Officer at CDD-Ghana said the pre-launch was to share outcomes and lessons learnt from the three years of implementing the DLT, allow stakeholders to familiarise themselves with the initiative and brief them on the 2017 DLT.

He said the DLT is to ensure that central government allocated resources to areas of special priority and better target district support.

Mrs. Gifty Eugenia Kusi, Deputy Western Regional Minister pledged her commitment to the DLT adding, “I personally embrace and fully support the DLT project in view of the fact that it is development oriented”.

She hoped the performance of the assemblies in the Region would see remarkable improvement in the 2017 DLT.