Decentralisation means power to the people

When local development is decided by a central government, not much good comes of it. In Samfya, Zambia, the people are fighting for their right to be heard.

These windmills in Samfya where constructed in spite of the wishes of the local people. They have never worked, despite the high cost involved.

Wilbroad Musaba has never been to a social science school to study, but nowadays he is becoming a self styled social policy analyst. As a zone trustee for Chifunabuli area development committee, he is being kept abreast on social policy issues through a good governance and democracy programme run by Samfya district council under the support of Danish Association for International Cooperation (MS-Zambia).

And he puts up an intelligent argument about how issues of political and civil rights, good governance and democracy influence human development. Mostly he seems more conversant with issues of decentralisation.

However, unlike social policy experts, Mr Musaba does not search for text book theories when outlining the disadvantages of the centralized control and management of social service delivery.

Instead he ferrets out vivid images of projects that have failed because they were controlled and managed through the current centralized system in Lusaka.

“In Masonde area, ‘experts’ came from Lusaka to sink a well. Without consulting the local people, they sited and sunk the well in an old graveyard. People do not drink from that well,” he told this reporter in an interview.

For Mr Musaba, the inappropriate sighting of the water well project and resulting wastage of resources goes to show how centralized decisions made by “those people in Lusaka are out of touch with the wishes and needs of the Masonde community.”

The chairman of the Chifunabuli development committee Thomas Sweta supports Mr Musaba’s view. “You see if structures like the ADCs were in place and involved in making decisions on development, the well in Masonde was not going to be sunk in the graveyard and the waste of resources was going to be avoided.”

And just close to Mr Sweta’s house stand three windmills that are a symbol of shortcomings of centrally made development decisions.

Micro Projects Unit (MPU) installed the windmills at a cost of over K150 million so that they could draw water into eight massive aerial tanks to supply the residents of Lubwe. But the project was planned and executed with complete disregard of the local people’s needs and feelings.

According to district planning officer, Anthony Mwenya, local people asked for an electrical water pump from the now defunct Micro projects Unit. Surprising consultants at the unit decided against the community desires and thought the windmills were appropriate for the poor community.

For years these mistakes have gone without local people raising concerns. But with the level of awareness on decentralisation created in the 22 local government wards where MS-Zambia has provided support for the formation of area development committees, people are awakening to question the wrongs.

The area development committees were formed in readiness of the government completing the decentralisation process. Government committed itself to a 10-year plan to complete the implementation of the National Decentralisation Policy.

In the first phase that ran from November 18, 2002 to December 31, 2005, government was expected, among other things, to approve the interim decentralisation policy implementation plan—that was done on November 11, 2004, transfer of the secretariat from cabinet office to local government ministry and completion of the comprehensive decentralisation policy implementation plan.

The decentralisation policy implementation plan outlines key components including sensitisation, civic education and consolidating democratic culture, and to develop a comprehensive legal framework that facilitates the implementation of the policy.

It is this legal framework that is supposed to formalise the decentralisation policy including community structures, also known as ADCs in short, which are proposed in the current decentralisation policy as organisations through which government will link with communities to involve local people in the control and management of social service delivery.

But the legal framework has not yet been developed and the decentralisation policy seems to be facing some setbacks.

These setbacks notwithstanding the ADCs in Samfya have been busy working quietly and are becoming influential in mobilising and organising as well as sensitising communities on issues of good governance and the need to demand control and management of their development affairs.

And there have been some successes. At the beginning of this month people in Kabongo area blocked a road contractor from upgrading the road that the district council recommended to Roads Development Agency (RDA) for funding without consulting the local people.

The local people felt the road recommended by the council was only going to service a few elite farmers in the area. They made their statement by protesting against the contractor, forcing RDA to agree to fund both the rejected road and the alternative road demanded by the community.

In Kasaba, 91 kilometres north of Samfya, the preoccupation of the ADC is to pressure the area MP Enerst Mwansa to canvass government to construct a bridge across the Kasaba plain to link the area to Luwingu district in the Northern Province.

The idea of the road came out of a public meeting at which members of the community had a chance to forward their views.

“When we call for an open meeting, at least everyone brings forward developmental issues. After that the committee sits down and chooses the appropriate project,” said Rosemary Mwape, a member of Kasaba ADC.

“Following deliberations on projects and, when we happen to have a deadlock, we subject the issues to voting. But we are happy the last time we met everyone voted for construction of the bridge to link Kasaba to Luwingu,” explained Ms Mwape.

Traditional stereotypes that put women on the sidelines of development are also being addressed.

Mr Musaba said in the past women were not given rights to speak here. It was thought men had more rights than women. “That has changed with the coming of ADCs as we are learning that women have comparable capacities.”

Juliet Shyolande

And Juliet Shyolande, the treasurer for Mwaba zone in the Kapata area development committee, says: “good governance means having a system that provides individuals regardless of their status with rights to decide their destiny. When we meet we feel we have that voice to decide our destiny because even women speak, no one can shut them up.”

And Juliet Shyolande, the treasurer for Mwaba zone in the Kapata area development committee, says: “good governance means having a system that provides individuals regardless of their status with rights to decide their destiny. When we meet we feel we have that voice to decide our destiny because even women speak, no one can shut them up.”

Even the delays to complete the decentralisation process which to a large extent have caused ADCs to be limited in their functions seem not to shut up those voices either.

A number of ADCs’ leaders are upbeat about the benefits of decentralisation policy, though they feel it must be accelerated.

“Sometimes we feel we are not supposed to exist as ADCs because school managers in the area always question our legitimacy when we try to call them to discuss school projects,” says Danstan Mutaba of Kapata ADC.

Mr Mutaba said at times again, the ADCs feel to be failing the people because after people attend meetings, identify development needs and their proposals presented to government there is no response.

Danston Mutaba

However, Mr Mutaba said: “One satisfaction we get is that we have been shown the way to express ourselves and best way to speak to government with one voice”.

Further he points out that decentralisation will make social service delivery to become faceless of partisan politics.

“Since government will be responding to developmental needs identified by local people through ADCs that function above partisan politics, development will come as an end of meeting social needs and not means of cadres trying to gain political votes,” said Mr Mutaba.

Kapata ADC chairman Boniface Mwenso says the formation of ADCs has helped to mobilize and organise members of the community to be concerned with the development of their area.

“We can call 10 people from each zone, invite the headman and sit in a meeting to share ideas on our developmental needs,” said Mr Mwenso, adding that “in the past it was not happening.”

In Kasaba the ADC members believe decentralisation will cut down on bureaucracy that characterises the disbursing resources meant for development.

Paul Shapi said the current procedure for funding projects is unnecessarily long winded, leading administration activities swallowing large chunks of project funds at the expense of actual development.

“At present when government goes to source money, say in France, for development here the money will first have to sit in an office in Lusaka and before it leaves someone has to find a way to eat allowances out of it. Then the money has to come to Mansa where again people will have to eat part of it. By the time it passes through Samfya council to Kasaba, it only arrives in crumbs,” said Mr Shapi.

Boniface Mwenso

Mr Mwenso said decentralisation will enhance good governance and correct a lot of wrong things that have hampered the effective use of resources and efficient delivery of resources.

He said following on going sensitisation activities, people believe they need to be part of the development that takes place in their area, and they are also keen to see government complete the decentralisation process”.

“A lot of people want to be part of the development. They are keen about the decentralisation process that is why when we call for meetings they come in masse,” he said.

The United Nations Declaration on the right to development of 1986 puts development rights at the same level with civil and political rights.

The underlining rationale to this is that people are entitled to have their basic needs met, and that those in power have a duty and a moral obligation to facilitate this process.

Mr Sweta says the government in Zambia has at most managed to provide an environment in which civil and political rights of citizens are thriving.

“We have laws that protect our civil and political rights, and there are institutions where one can go to seek redress once they feel deprived of these rights. The media also speak on our behalf when we are aggrieved.”

But he says the same cannot be said about the economic rights.

He notes that it remains difficult for people to experience economic rights when decision making, management and control of development remains heavily centralized.

Ms Shyolande laments that at present government seems very far because there is no system of responding to people’s developmental needs as even the structures that it should use to communicate effectively with the community are not legally empowered to function.

A Kapilibila resident Ms Mary Chisha says what government is doing now is not facilitating the needs of beneficiaries but imposing projects. “How can we say government is facilitating when even the identification and budgeting of our projects is done in Lusaka”.

Ms Chisha said though decentralisation is a process that should be approached with caution, and while people in the communities need to keep their patience, government must show real commitment to fulfil its promise to decentralise.

Kapilibila ADC chairperson Beenwell Musonda sees decentralisation as a path that cannot be bypassed if government is to advance development that simultaneously promotes human rights.

He points out that people need a stake in the control and management of the affairs of their community especially when it comes to deciding what type of development should take place in their areas.

“Development should not be controlled from Lusaka. Those people do not know what is needed here in Kapilibila,” he said.

He said comparing Kapilibila ward where ADCs are a new phenomenon and the Luapula valley where the village regrouping concept has been practiced in implementing developmental projects, the valley has received much attention for social services.

“The valley is far developed because people have to a certain extent been in charge of their development,” he said.

Mr Musonda said more can be achieved in more areas of the country if decentralisation was completed and ADCs formalised, as people will be put in the driving seat of development.

He is not oblivious of the shortcomings that can be produced by a rushed decentralisation system, especially as a result of inadequate capacities in project identification, planning and issues of cost benefit analysis.

However, he notes that one happy thing is that ADCs in Samfya have been formed and government should start building their capacities in areas that are necessary to improve their administrative capabilities.

Mr Musonda also points out one sad part. “We hear some leaders in cabinet and parliament are for it while others are not in support of decentralisation.”

“Is it because some fear they will lose a grip on financial resources or authority to influence development?”

He said this position should not be allowed to prevail because decentralisation does not mean communities taking over from government but allowing government to take its most effective role of facilitating development.

Instead he advises that the greater good of complete decentralisation should take the upper hand of the argument rather the issue of protecting the status quo, while the process should be concluded.