THE sector ministers and their senior technical officers examined the main players’ role of promoting, facilitating and supporting education delivery and primary health care at the level of the 10 administrative regions in two days of meeting at the Guyana International Conference Centre (GICC).

The exercise organised by the Ministry of Local Government and Regional Development, and which got underway Thursday,was a continuation of a series of engagements which began in early January, and which brought together ministers of government responsible for the delivery of several programmes across the 10 administrative regions, with their technical team and senior regional officials. These include the Regional Chairmen (RCs,) the Regional Vice Chairmen (RVCs,) the Regional Executive Officers (REOs,) the Deputy Regional Executive Officers (DREOs,) the Regional Health Officers (RHOs) and the Regional Education Officers (REDOs.)
In attendance Thursday were Prime Minister Samuel Hinds, Minister of Local Government and Regional Development Norman Whittaker, the ministry’s Permanent Secretary Collin Croal, Minister of Health Dr. Bheri Ramsaran, Minister in the Ministry of Finance Juan Edghill and Minister in the Ministry of Agriculture Alli Baksh.
The meetings had the primary objective of identifying the prime challenges faced in the delivery of quality and timely goods and services to the residents in the regions, and as well on the measures that would be taken to eliminate these difficulties.
“I want to advocate to you that we should keep the faith and always reflect the faith that we Guyanese can and will attain a better quality of life that we are worthy of, and we will do so for us in Guyana, but that better quality of life would not come down from the skies, it will come out of our work,” Prime Minister Hinds noted.
The PM said the aim is to focus on getting ‘better each day’ by looking at the ways things can be done better, with regard to the delivery of services, with improvement not only in carrying out these duties, but doing so working as a team.
“Where we are today, we are quite advanced from where we were 20 or 40 years ag, and we should reflect on that, that we have brought improvements to some extent, we should feel some amount of satisfaction about that, but we know that we have to go much further,” he said.
Minister Whittaker noted that the meeting was being held at a time when the Commonwealth Heads of Government have formally recognised the role of local government in enhancing democratic governance, having endorsed the declaration of 2014 as the Year of Developmental Local Government. He said the ministry viewedthe two-day exercise as providing an opportunity to raise awareness of the role of local government in community development.
“Today must not be seen as an opportunity to debate who is right and who is wrong…it’s an opportunity for us to agree, in the first instance, that we have not been delivering the services that people expect of us. If we do not start off with that premise, we will not make much progress,” the Minister said.
He therefore challenged the regional officials to be actively involved in the exercise, to make inputs which can make a difference and which would lead to an improvement in the way things are done at the regional level, thereby enabling residents the opportunity to enjoy better quality goods and services.
Wednesday’s session focused on the RHOs whilst the next day REDOs were targeted, Croal explained. The meetings addressed four broad areas: challenges encountered in delivering health and educational services, internal distribution networks within the health and education sector, record keeping and database management, and the role of the health and education programme heads within the regions.
Recently the opportunity was provided for the REOs and DREOs to meet with sector ministers responsible for Local Government, Education, Heath, Public Works and Social Services on factors impeding the desired improvement in the way these services are delivered at the level of the region. (GINA)