• The main objective was to introduce the project to key actors such as DCMCs, Regional Coordinating Directors and Economic Planners, District Chief Executives, District Coordinating Directors, District Planning and Budget Officers, officials of Ministries, Departments and Agencies, as well as local and international NGOs.
• The meeting was also aim at promoting local ownership and building synergies, especially with NGOs working in the respective districts

The following issues and commitments came up during open forum.

Emerging Issues

• Participants contended that there is the need for stakeholders to have access to relevant documents on the project to enhance their understanding of the project and their role in its implementation. In this regard, SEND was called upon to share the necessary documentation on the project with stakeholders to enhance their understanding and uptake of the project.
• Unlike DACF which is a statutory fund, it emerged that the DDF is a performance based fund and MMDAs must qualify under the criterion to access the fund. Thus participants called on MMDAs to work hard to meet the criterion in order to benefit from the fund which has proven to be a reliable alternative to the DACF.
• Participants also came to a consensus that community durbars are an effective way of reaching citizens with relevant information. SEND was called upon to use the community durbar approach to carry out the sensitization on DDF while using local languages where necessary. In doing so, DCMC were encouraged to liaze with District Planning Officers to help select community for sensitizations.
• A DCMC member raised a concern about the difficulty in accessing information from the various MMDAs under previous project partly due to the perception that the DCMCs are against the MMDAs. The MMDAs reminded of their commitment in the MOU which they have signed with SEND and encouraged them to endeavor to honor their commitment whiles SEND and its partners continues to work to address perception issues.

Commitments

• SEND-Ghana committed to officially write to introduce the project to stakeholders with relevant documentation for better understanding.
• MMDAs pledged to provide resource persons for sensitizations on DDF.
• District Planning Officers committed to increase collaboration with DCMC members and provide relevant data for the success of the project as well as help identify communities for sensitization.
• MMDAs further pledged to put DDF signs on DDF funded projects in line with RCC directive.