Ernest Sumelong
17 April 2008
Poor project conception and management, which has been Government's bane, might soon be redressed, following a 12-day training of public sector practitioners on Project Planning and Management.
The problem of poorly implemented or failed projects over the years compelled government to solicit the Governance and Institutional Development Division of the Commonwealth Secretariat in London and the Pan African Institute for Development - West Africa, PAID-WA - to train some 30 people of the public sector and civil society organisations.
From March 31 to April 11, the participants from Ministries and civil society organisations were schooled on how to identify, design, plan, effectively manage, monitor and evaluate projects in the public service.
Each of the participants is expected to use the acquired skills to improve on project design and implementation in their various ministries and services, the Director in charge of Relations with the Commonwealth in the Ministry of External Relations, Felix Mbayu, told The Post during a certificate award ceremony for the participants on April 11.
"This workshop was necessitated by the fact that Government had realised that there are many projects that have not been implemented or have simply failed. So we had to conceive the workshop and suggest it to the Commonwealth Secretariat, which sponsored it in collaboration with the Pan African Institute that carried out the training," he said.
On why the training became so important, the Director of PAID-WA, Mrs Rosetta Bola Thompson said the problem of project failure is too rampant in Africa."There is no reason why there should be project failures when we have people who are able to handle projects successfully.
It is important for us to have a critical core of project experts in the public service who can handle projects," she said.At the end of 12 days, participants now better understand how to identify, prioritise and monitor projects in the public service, according to one of the participants, Mrs Claudette Awa Babila, a Magistrate who works in the Ministry of Justice.
PAID-WA that provides training, research and consultancy services, would be carrying out specialised development programmes such as Gender Analysis, Human Resource Management etc, according to the Director.
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