The Ghana Federation of Disability Organisations (GFD) has appealed to the government to increase the 3% of the District Assembly Common Fund allocated to Persons With Disability (PWDs) to at least 5%.
According to the federation, the current 3% is woefully inadequate to cater for the number of PWDs in the various districts in Ghana, with the situation worsened by the undue delays and difficulties in assessing the fund.
The national president of the Ghana Society for the Physically Disabled (GSPD), Mathew Annor Kodom, made the appeal at a sensitisation programme on the revised District Assembly Common Fund (DACF) guidelines 2022 in Sunyani.
Kodom said that political interference and insufficient funding, among others, are issues confronting members that the new revised guidelines seek to address.
“The challenges range from insufficient funding; we also found out that there’s political interference on behalf of the MCEs and the MPs. That is why we have brought in the new revision guideline, and that one has addressed all the challenges that we encountered in our overview report that we went throughout the country to find out from the members,” he said.
Kodom also urged Parliament to speed up the passage process of the revised guidelines.
The Bono Regional vice president of the PWDs, Sirina Mahamadu, added that the delay in disbursement is affecting their members.
“The district assembly’s common fund for persons with disabilities doesn’t come regularly. Just like the Ghanaian common fund, the various common funds come from the various assemblies.”
The leadership and governance advisor for Ghana Somubi Dwumadie, Vivian Sarpomaa Fiscian, also called on the MMDCEs to give fair opportunities to PWDs with support from key people in the assemblies to manage the fund.
“There is a high level of political interference, especially from the district chief executives. Some of them use it for different reasons – favouritism – and those people may not be persons with disabilities, but because it’s a common fund, they find themselves putting their family members, friends, and relatives on the beneficiary list.
“Others will, based on political favourites, find a way to put them in there. A whole lot, and you heard that some DCEs from the conversation would virtually even hijack the process and, therefore, not give opportunity to persons with disabilities themselves,” Fiscian said.
Daniel Donkor
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