
Local Governance Participation Initiatve at WillWay Africa
Our Local Governance initiative
is dubbed ‘Grassroots Transparency Initiative’ (GTI). GTI is an elaborate
program of civic education and capacity building for the political
empowerment of rural communities. GTI promotes sustainable rural development
through transparent and community-centered governance and leadership. GTI is a
departure from conventional civic education program that are either urban
oriented or dominated by elite political actors even at the local level. Such
program also do not fit the needs and context of communities where political
empowerment must go beyond information flow to include the building of
sustainable structures for transparency.
We identified the low participation of the youth in local governance as an impediment to democracy and the socioeconomic development of rural communities in Ghana.
The design of Initiative is informed
by our belief that it is only when rural
governance actors and structures are held accountable by rural dwellers that
the right environment will be created for sustaining interventions and gains
made in equally critical areas such as health, agriculture, education and
economic opportunity.
WillWay Africa implements intervention
aimed at increasing youth participation in local governance as a more
sustainable way of helping to bring about youth-centred economic and
developmental policies at the grassroots level and increase the transparency
and accountability of local government actors.