…we’ve put in place mechanisms to sustain impact – Bauchi, Ebonyi

By Gabriel Ewepu

ABUJA – FOLLOWING the importance of quality service to citizens, seven states have hailed the United States Agency for International Development, USAID, over its project, State2State Activity project on improved service delivery to their citizens and increased revenue generation.

The States include Sokoto, Adamawa, Gombe, Bauchi, Kebbi, Akwa-Ibom and Ebonyi, and it also works at the federal level; the Open Government Partnership Secretariat of the Ministry of Budget and Planning; Nigerian Governors Forum; and SEVICOM Office.

The Heads of Service of the seven States including the Director General, DG, Nigerian Governors Forum, were present at a the Community of Practice Meeting of Heads of Service in Abuja, and organised by the USAID State2State Activity.

The Nigeria State Accountability, Transparency, and Effectiveness (State2State) is funded by USAID, and the State2State Activity supports, strengthens governance structures in seven states in Nigeria to improve their ability to plan and budget, raise revenues, increase civil society participation, and oversee service delivery in the health; education; and Water Hygiene and Sanitation.

Speaking on the sidelines of the meeting, on the impact of the project in the last five years on civil servants in the States and Abuja in terms of how they were delivering services, generating revenue, doing procurement, and now, the Deputy Chief of Party, USAID State2State Activity, Stanley Achonu, said, “We are also helping the states improve their revenue generation to be able to meet demands of citizens.

“We are also helping to increase the voices of citizens in governance through imputing to the budget design, into the items in the budget through what we call the ‘Citizens Charter of Demand’ that the government considers in designing state budgets.

“So, essentially to bring together government and citizens in deciding how public resources are managed, but also to build the capacity of government to then better manage their resources on behalf of the citizens.

“I can give you a few examples of changes that we are seeing in patterns. The recently announced Sokoto State Government Budget will be allocating a minimum of 15% to health, 25 per cent to education, primary education, primary health.”

He also added that, “To see the impact of this would be when you see the increased number of children in school, better trained staff but the actual measure would not be improved as a result of students’ performance in examination, in national examination, and state examination.

“Our project is essentially focused on improving revenue mobilization and allocation to critical sectors. We believe that improved service delivery is also a way of tackling corruption.”

The Country Director, DAI, Dr Joe Abah, Development Alternatives Incorporated, DAI, said is implementing the USAID State2State Activity, and explained that, “The project works principally on public financial management, the way that money is used in a society.

“It also works on mitigating conflicts. It works on making sure that there is gender inclusion.

“It works on health, education, water and sanitation. But because, like I said, the civil service is the engine of growth, all these sectors need to be coordinated by the civil service.

“So it’s important that they are fully aware of these projects. They are also the ones responsible for capacity building.”

Meanwhile, one of the participants at the meeting, the Bauchi State Head of Service, HoS, Yahuza Haruna said, “The USAID State2State Activity Project has impacted positively looking at the our Public Financial Management, Civil Service and Public Civil Reforms, and also our local and social perspectives in terms of revenue generation, governance it has impacted positively in so many areas governance, procurement, budgeting, monitoring and evaluation, fiscal responsibility, and budget reforms.”

Meanwhile, on sustainability of the USAID State2State Activity Project by the Bauchi State Government, he said, “So what we did in Bauchi is we have a sustainable process where all the projects, programmes, and events of development partners are factored into our budget and financial management system. So any moment they are moving, we are already financing, so we are ready to take over.

“Not only that, we also ensure that we have a local content in what they are doing. Most of the staff they are having there are staff that are also from Bauchi State, that are also from the civil service of the State, that are on secondment to the organizations. So by the time they are leaving, it is easy for us to come back and assimilate with these people. Not only that, we are doing sector-specific, sustainability projects.”

Also, the Ebonyi State Head of Service, Dr Rita Okoro, said, “So far so good, it has been of immense help in building the capacities of our civil servants.

“We are doing things better, the service is more effective and more efficient. State2State has come in various ways, like I said earlier, our civil servants are better qualified and better equipped to handle some very sensitive positions such as finance and budgeting.

“They have given us the enablement to plan our budgets better, to come up with plans better, to time ourselves.

“Before they came, we didn’t have that ability to work with time but currently, every programme has a timeline and all of our deliverables are timed. So that is essentially what they have done for us.

“It has put us in a position to better advise the government, to better guide the government. We have a higher percentage of allocations to these four very critical sectors.

“A lot of capacity building has been made, like I said earlier on. I think we have capacities to step down some of these trainings. There is support from the government. We are going to step down most of these trainings or all of these trainings to ensure that a higher percentage of our civil servants have this capacity.”