UNDP calls for more investment in people-centered local governance structures that are responsive and inclusive
The COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on health and socio-economic structures show the fragilities in national systems and local communities' resilience in dealing with crises.
The demands on local governance systems to deliver essential services, particularly during COVID-19 lockdowns, demonstrated that countries require a rethink on how to invest more in subnational systems and strengthening responsive, accountable and inclusive core governance functions is core to COVID-19 recovery and building forward better.
“Fundamentally, ensuring service delivery, building social capital and strengthening the social contract, and basic functionality of state governance is a pre-requisite to good governance. Strengthening states' core governance functions is an important investment in public administration and service delivery and in enhancing resilience, strengthening the social contract, and building peaceful and resilient societies. To achieve the SDGs and the Agenda 2063 for Africa, development plans should focus on both the national and local levels.” Said Dr. Roselyn Akombe, Regional Coordinator, Governance and Peace Building, UNDP.
Besides enhancing state governance capacity that helps African countries improve service delivery, African governments also need to tackle the challenge of the legitimacy of authority, peace, and stability to advance economic development and promote national and social cohesion, including building dialogue between government and government public. If local communities are well organized and cohesive, they too can play a critical role in strengthening social cohesion and sustaining peace in fragile settings because most conflicts tend to occur at the local level (that is, ethnic conflicts and land disputes).
The UNDP Resident Representative in Kenya Mr. Walid Badawi noted that public trust in institutions continues to decline, especially at the national level, as the public now looks to local governments to deliver basic services. “Building trustworthy, accountable and inclusive institutions to address concerns over the fraying social contract and the associated governance and peacebuilding challenges is critical. Broadening the focus on governance from the political elite to a people-centred approach ensures that governments pay much more attention to economic governance, local governance and delivery of public services that speak to the needs of the majority.” He added.
Local governance in border and cross-border regions also presents critical regional dimensions, as reflected in UNDP's work through the Africa Borderlands Centre and its stabilization work in the Sahel, the Lake Chad basin and the Liptako-Gourma regions. Through this work, UNDP has witnessed the limits of development approaches that focus exclusively on national development and overlook the unique challenges of borderlands. Therefore, UNDP aims to support and facilitate the development of borderlands programming in local governance, service delivery and social cohesion with a focus on whole-of-society and systems approaches.
