BE MORE ACCOUNTABLE TO YOUR BENEFICIARIES

Tuesday, 13 December 2011 17:58

Written by peacefmonline

The Co-ordinator In-charge of Kasa/CSOs and Governance at Care International, Zakaria Yakubu has stressed the need for CSOs and NGOs to be more accountable and transparent to their target communities. According to him, CSOs are quick to demand accountability and transparency from government; however they are reluctant to be accountable to their beneficiaries.

Mr. Zakaria Yakubu was speaking at CSOs Capacity Building Workshop on Financial Governance and Management as well as monitoring and Evaluation for impact for CSOs Finance and Programme Managers in the Natural Resource Sector in Kumasi.

The seven-day Capacity Building Workshop on Financial Governance and Management as well as monitoring and Evaluation for impact for CSOs Finance and Programme Managers was organized by Care International in partnership with ICCO and DANIDA.

More than 60 participants drawn from all the ten regions in Ghana attended the training workshop. The training was aimed at equipping the participants with skills and tools to check the financial health of their organizations, check level of accountability, control fraud and improve financial governance.

Topics treated include “Introduction to Financial Governance and Accountability”, “Fraud Prevention and Control”, “Financial Planning and Budgeting” as well as “NGO Financial Reporting” among others.

In his presentation on the Topic: “Introduction to Financial Governance and Accountability, Mr. Zakaria reminded CSOs and NGOs that the funds they received do not belong to them but to the beneficiary communities and they are just holding them in trust. This, according to him, enforces CSOs and NGOs to be more accountable to their target beneficiaries. He expressed concern that most organizations fails to be accountable to their beneficiaries.

Mr. Zakaria noted that demonstrating accountability to beneficiaries is very important. According to him, accountability to beneficiaries brings important practical advantages including increasing the sense of ownership that beneficiaries fell towards the Ngo's works. The Co-ordinator entreated CSOs and NGOs to put in place internal control measures in order to reduce risk and fraud in their organizations. He urged the NGOs not to take advantage of the numerous challenges in the sector to run away from accountability.

The Impact Measurement and Accountability Manager at Care International, Oliver Eleeza entreated the participants to see monitoring and evaluation as one of major component in project and programmes management if they want to make positive impact in the live of their beneficiaries.

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