The Minister of Local Government, James Musoni, has called on local leaders not to ignore contingencies when planning for their districts. Musoni made the call at the opening of a weeklong training for Mayors in Gashora, Bugesera district.  Musoni said not planning for contingencies can affect the implementation of other development projects."Contingencies like disasters occur, and all that district authorities do is to concentrate on containing them, thus suspending the implementation process of other projects,” he noted."The eventualities must be included in the planning process, so when they occur, you accommodate them and keep on implementing what you had planned”.Apart from Mayors, the training also attracted directors of planning. The objective of the training is to empower local leaders with skills and capacities to enable them improve their performance and speed up the realisation of the country’s socio-economic transformation."We are building capacities for local officials purposely to promote efficiency, effectiveness and develop in them self-confidence, patriotism and sacrifice so as to have a dignified society and nation,” said Musoni.The minister called on the participants to have a high level of professionalism and patriotism, and a sense of sacrifice to uplift the standards of the people they lead.Musoni also called on the local leaders to be focused and relevant to confront the challenges they always encounter with new ideas and demonstrating ownership in executing their assigned mandate.