By Nasratu Kargbo
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Resident Representative in Sierra Leone Fredrick Ampiah has called on implementation partners to ensure that they deliver on their 2024 work plan and that they do so within the time frame.
Ampiah during the joint board meeting and signing ceremony of the UNDP 2024 annual work plan held on the 4th March 2024 said “We will not hesitate as a board together with the ministry of planning to reallocate those budgets to ministries that are performing”. He encouraged partners to deliver, stressing that they have prioritized those activities and should ensure that they deliver on them.
He explained that at the end of June and July, they’ll be organizing a meeting to look at the delivery and performance of the implementation partners, and those that are not delivering, would have to explain the reasons despite the resources at hand.
He mentioned the relevance of the joint board meeting that allows them to take stock of what they have been doing as an organization with the government in the past four years, forecast what they want to achieve between 2025 to 2030 and synchronize their strategic plan with the country’s national development plan and the SDGs.
Ampiah revealed that the UNDP’s portfolio is about seven million dollars, that it will barely solve any problem in the country, but that the work plans will fill the gaps that the government will find challenging t. “They are not exhaustive by themselves, but they are a gateway to opening bigger portfolios,” he said.
“If you take the inflation rate for instance is 52%, 92% of debt ratio to GDP, it tells us that this is a country that needs all the resources that it can get” he said. The Resident Representative explained that UNDP’s role is to leverage the government’s resources to help the government accelerate its development aspiration and to deliver and optimize its resources.
Minister of Planning and Economic Development (MOPED) Kenyeh Barlay said “I call for a comprehensive implementation framework with clear follow-up and reporting mechanism to ensure value for money. I want to urge all sector ministries, departments and agencies to devote their time to the timely delivery of the expected results”.
She said they will consider reallocating funds if they do not get the expected outcome.
The Minister explained that mechanisms and structures with the Development Cooperation Framework (DCF) will establish a comprehensive monitoring and assessment mechanism and facilitate multi-stakeholder discussion on implementation, reporting and harmonization of interventions.
Barlay said the UNDP has taken their time to align its programmes with Medium Term Development Plan (MTDP) 2024 to 2030 and the SDGs. She added that the signing came at a crucial time after the MTDP was launched. The programme was climaxed with the signing of the UNDP 2024 annual work plans.
Copyright © 2024 Politico (06/03/24)
