Govt officials laud USAID State2state implementation in Gombe
The Gombe State government on Monday commended the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) funded Accountability, Transparency and Effectiveness (State2State) Activity being implemented in the state.
They disclosed this in Gombe during USAID State2state programme assessment meeting with stakeholders in the state.
The meeting was tagged, “First Pause and Reflect Session: Learning and Reforming Session with Gombe State Partners in Health, Basic Education and WASH.”
Mr Bulus Nuhu, the Executive Director, Standard and Compliance, Gombe State Internal Revenue Service, said the State2State programme had impacted positively in boosting the state’s internally generated revenue.
Nuhu said the technical support from USAID had initiated a lot of reforms and helped improved public financial management, budgeting cycle, policy drafting amongst others.
On his part, Mohammed Kulani, Director, Final Accounts, Office of the Accountant-General, Gombe State, said the USAID training was apt and timely in view of the state’s desire to catch up with other climes in terms of preparing reports that meet best global practice.
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Kulani said the training had helped “in preparing account on how to meet time frames, citizens’ accountability report and the State’s Treasury Single Account.”
“The Treasury Single Account where the account of the state government can be viewed on one single dashboard is another area where State2State has made impact.
“The processes of consolidating the account of the state on one single dashboard is an enormous project, so with the training from State2State it has become easier for us and we give kudos to USAID for this,” he said.
Ibrahim Shuaibu, Director Planning, Research and Statistics, Ministry of Water Resources commended the USAID State2state programme implementation in the state
Shuaibu, represented by Dumo Massa, Monitoring and Evaluation Officer at the Ministry said staff of the ministry had been empowered with training in the area of monitoring and evaluation, budget profiling, information technology and dissemination.
The director stated that prior to the State2state training, “we had issues tracking the progress of work but now with USAID training, we are more efficient and effective.”
Mrs Ivy Dooga, the Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning Strategist for the USAID State2State, Gombe State office said no fewer than 820 persons had been trained in Gombe State in one year.
Dooga said that the training for the 820 persons cut across men, women and persons with disabilities, and was conducted in one fiscal year from Oct 2020 to Sept 2021.
She said that the training was aimed at bridging systematic, human capacity and organisational gaps discovered during its baseline assessment and surveys conducted in the state before the commencement of the programme.
According to her, the trainings which focused on public financial management, citizens engagement, conflict mitigations were given to government officials and Civil Society Organisations in the state.
Dooga stressed that the implementation of the USAID programme in Gombe State had prioritised inclusiveness, responsiveness and equity.
“We are happy that this is now reflecting in the state government’s work plan.”
“Looking at what we have done, we are here today to assess our performance to see gaps to be filled and best practices to be leveraged towards implementing other components of the State2State going forward,” Dooga said.
She commended the state government for its positive response and the level of synergy, adding that it was still working to ensure that government prioritised citizens’ needs.
