EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

From 5th to 8th of February 2010 the Ministry of Local Governments organized a Local Government retreat in the Northern Province, Musanze district, which brought together the Ministry of Local Governments, Governors of Provinces, the Mayor of Kigali City, Mayors and Executive Secretaries of Districts. RALGA was also present as the association of Local Government authorities. The meeting discussed various issues and identified various challenges facing the Local Governments.

As a follow up action, RALGA, in its normal advocacy responsibility, decided to carry out a study on six of the identified challenges in the Local Governments, namely:

i. Duplication of roles and responsibilities at the Province, Kigali City and District levels which limit effective performance of Districts;

ii. Lack of clear segregation of duties within the District Executive Committee and between the former and the technical staff;

iii. Regulations and instructions that are scattered that limit their effectiveness and are sometimes contradictory;

iv. District structures and staffing levels that do not correspond to the growing demands to deliver services to the public;

v. Composition of District Council which includes at the same time District staff (e.g. teachers), what may sometimes compromise its oversight and control function over the District management;

vi. Inadequate financial resources to districts and Sub-District levels to support the day to day running costs.

Objectives of the study are:

1. To have a clear understanding of each of the identified issue and related recommendations

2. To find facts that form the basis of each of those problems

3. To identify actual and potential negative outcomes.

4. To collect informed views of Local Governments on the best actions to perform so that those issues could be resolved successfully.

This study was carried out in the four Provinces plus the City of Kigali. Categories of respondents were presidents of District Councils, Mayors, Vice Mayors, and Executive Secretaries. One District from each Province and the City of Kigali was purposively sampled for each category of respondent.

The basis of this was that respondents from each category in the sampled Districts had stayed in the District leadership for a significantly long time, that, they were very well aware of the challenges raised during the retreat. Diversity of the sampled Districts was also considered. Nineteen respondents were interviewed from thirteen selected Districts.

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PDF - Challenges facing local governments in Rwanda