Accountability

 











Photo Credit; Foreign Policy Magazine

For the last 5 months, the Ebola virus has infected more than 2000 people according to statistics from the World Health Organisation, the majority of whom are from the West African countries of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. I have been following the debates online since the first cases were reported in June, I believe. Citizens from these countries particularly from Sierra Leone had expressed concern over their government's reluctance to share information about the true nature of the situation. The government at the time declared that the situation had been contained and there was no need to declare an emergency. Of course the reverse was true as evidenced by the current situation. I will not delve into what should have been done by these governments and why they didnt do it at the time. Instead, I will focus on the big picture. I have been inspired by an article that appeared in the Foreign Policy Magazine on August 14th, 2014 which clearly showed that the problem with Africa's Ebola crisis is not really about a poor health care system but also a crisis in governance. I'm hesitant to use the term 'social contract' so I will keep this rather simple.

Truth is we have no idea what our governments do, how they do it and when they'll do it. Oh yes we hear all the promises no doubt, but we dont hold them to account. The government on the other hand believe that what they do, how they do it and when they'll do it is their own prerogative. They don't need to consult the people.
Let me break it down even further. How many of us have actually attended a budget hearing for our constituency, be it a local government, district, province or even state? If we did attend, did we make any contributions? Most of our governments don't even hold public hearings during the budgetary process so we dont even have a say in what we believe the government should consider as a priority in the next fiscal year, yet we are supposedly the intended beneficiaries. It's revenue derived from or taxes that actually forms a part of that budget.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have a situation.

Until we learn to ask our leaders questions, until we learn to persist till we get answers, until we learn to hold them to their word, nothing will change. Our leaders are famous for building structures but not for providing the required services for which the structures were built.

Clearly, we are in a crisis, not just a health crisis but a crisis of leadership. The government is our employee, not our boss. It's time we start to ask some very important questions. Remember the government  can't provide all the solutions; governance is only effective when it's a two way street.