Cut the red tape in Local Government structures

A report commissioned by the Kigali City Council has pointed out that land bureaux across districts making up KCC are crippled by bureaucracy. The report quotes residents of Kigali City complaining about poor archiving of land documents and the long periods of time that one is likely to take before accessing these important documents. Though the report concentrated mainly on land bureaux and only on Kigali City, the same can be said of service departments in almost all local government structures. Much as the Central Government has been at the forefront of calling for a change in mindset and attitude towards service delivery, the message seems to be taking long to sink in. It’s not rare for one to see a district official kicking out ordinary citizens seeking assistance on some pressing issues simply because they say it’s their time for a lunch break. The unfortunate habit of tossing people around and the ‘I don’t care’ attitude seems to have formed bedrock within some of our local government structures. This, on top of the most unbecoming language these officials use to address those seeking their service. The new decentralisation policy gives a lot of powers to local government officials. The fundamental reason behind this new empowerment lies in the need to breakdown the cancer of bureaucracy and to expedite service delivery to Rwandans. The ultimate goal is to change the lives of the ordinary Rwandans. Indeed Rwanda’s aggressive decentralisation policy has been given a clean bill of health by the development partners. But there’s need to understand that it will neither be the Central Government nor our development partners to police how they make good use of these powers. While the Central Government can help in training these officials, it remains an individual’s responsibility to adapt to the changing trends, emphasised by government, which treats good service delivery as a priority. They need to get their acts together and understand that times are changing. A competitive culture defined by excellent service delivery should have been achieved yesterday. Ends

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Cut the red tape in Local Government structures