Abstract
Fiscal decentralization continues to gain prominence in international development discourse and policy analysis, with a significant body of literature devoted to it. But one issue that has never been lost in public discourse hinges on good governance and judicious utilization of scarce resources. This study therefore examines revenue mobilization at the local government level using Bongo District Assembly (BDA) as a study area. Specifically, it unravels the major sources of revenue to the Assembly and revenue administration. The study is a qualitative study which uses thematic analysis in data processing. One FGD comprising six revenue payers (made up of market queens and leaders of various associations) and seven IDIs (comprising four management members and three revenue collectors) were sampled for the study. The study revealed massive revenue leakages and poor citizenry engagement resulting in a huge over reliance on external funding for its annual budget. It is recommended that BDA should roll out both compelling and motivating mechanisms such as motivation of revenue collectors and constant monitoring to eliminate revenue leakages while enhancing efficient utilization of public resources. Keywords: Revenue, Decentralization, Local Government, Revenue Sources, Revenue Collectors. DOI: 10.7176/RJFA/11-16-01 Publication date: August 31 st 2020
Highlights
Introduction ManyCountries across the globe have focused on decentralization of the operations of the government with the sole objective of ensuring efficiency and better effectiveness of the administration of state owned resources
4.0 Results and Discussion 4.1.1 Funding District Assemblies This section seeks to find out the key revenue sources available to the District Assembly
The quotations below represent these views: I can say transfer should be increased especially our situation over here, we are the less deprived, we are among the less deprived areas so our IGF is very weak unlike the big areas like Accra, Techiman and those places. If they can increase the transfer it will help a lot. [ABC] In my opinion when it comes to [fiscal decentralization] may be if they increase it [the transfer] that will rather help because when it comes for them to delegate the tax for us to collect we may not be able to collect all for that matter the funds will be insufficient for us to undertake activities
Summary
Countries across the globe have focused on decentralization of the operations of the government with the sole objective of ensuring efficiency and better effectiveness of the administration of state owned resources. Decentralization brings about positive outcomes in both democratic and developmental terms and ensures that democracy is deepened by the extension of political representation to the local levels (Akorsu, 2015). The first is based on the assumption that the demand for local public services varies from place to place. Decentralized provision of local services will adjust to the multifaceted demands. Efficiency is the second; it can be argued that locally financed and produced services will cost less. Co-ordination at the local level is necessary and local public services cannot and would not be treated independently. Local government can co-ordinate these services much more than a national government would
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