The attention of the government has been drawn to the seeming neglect of five state institutions and the need to adequately resource them to play their mandated roles.
The neglect is said to have affected their performance and that a move to equip these institutions would go a long way to make them functional.
The five institutions are; the Department of Social Welfare, Information Services Department (ISD), National Commission on Civic Education (NCCE), the Ghana National Fire Service (GNFS) and the Ghana National Prison Service, which are literally distressed and need urgent assistance to function.
The Social Welfare Department is an important Department of the state for the upliftment of Women, Children, Old age people and other deprived sections for the protection and promotion of the society.
The functions of the Department include developing and coordinating community-based rehabilitation programmes for persons with disabilities and promoting access to social welfare services for the disadvantaged, vulnerable and excluded groups and individuals.
The Information Services Department is the principal public relations outfit of the Government which empowers citizens through informed communication.
Its primary mandate is to disseminate Government policies, programmes and activities, as well as access feedback for policy refinement.
The National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) is a government agency responsible for the education of citizens on civic matters.
The fourth of the mentioned institutions, the Ghana Prisons Service is a key stakeholder of the Criminal Justice System of Ghana and contributes to the maintenance of internal security by maintaining an efficient, humane and safe reformatory penal system operated within the laws of Ghana.
The Ghana Prisons Service is tasked with the safe custody of convicted persons from the courts as well as the provision of Reformation and Rehabilitation programmes for their successful resettlement into society.
The Ghana National Fire Service extinguishes fires in their area and thus protects life and property in the event of fires in their jurisdiction.
It also rescues and protects people in the event of a road traffic collision.
Its functions include Organizing Public Fire Education programmes, providing Technical advice for building plans in respect of machinery and structural layouts to facilitate escape from fire, rescue operations and fire management and inspecting and offering technical advice on fire extinguishers.
Patrick Kwame Frimpong, the Presiding member of the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA) who raised serious concerns about the ineffectiveness of these institutions says from close observation over the years that they are under resourced.
He added that past governments since the inception of the Fourth Republic have not paid attention to enhancing their performance.
He mentioned that the Rawlings administration procured Fire Tenders in 1999 which arrived in Kufuor’s era who also procured another batch of Fire tenders only to be delivered in 2009.
Apart from these attempts to equip the Fire Service with the requisite logistics, the Atta Mills/Mahama administration and the current Akufo-Addo administration have failed to resource the firefighting agency.
Mr Frimpong has, therefore, suggested that the government should redefine their roles and resource them adequately to function efficiently.
His concerns emanate from the ineffectiveness of the named institutions in the face of lack of logistics and funding to function.
