The fair, which runs for three days, was put together by the Ministry of Monitoring and Evaluation to facilitate ministries, departments and agencies of the government to furnish the country with the results of the various policies and interventions that they had spearheaded.

Organised under the theme, “Delivery results for citizens work in progress,” each ministry has been assigned a booth where its departments and agencies are exhibiting the results of their various policies and programmes.

Evidence of results

The ministries are employing different strategies to sell the contribution they have offered to the success of the government’s performance at the fair.

While some were using infographics to display and share data with the public on their performance, others were giving out leaflets with information on their achievements at their booth.

For instance, the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) under the Ministry of Gender and Social Protection is exhibiting the results of the LEAP programme since 2017 with infographics boldly displayed at their booth.

The infographics outlines the number of beneficiaries that have been captured under the poverty alleviating strategy as well as the amount of money invested into the programme in the last three years.

The Head of Communications for the LEAP programme, Mr Colson Akanbasiam told Graphic Online that the fair was a positive contribution to the efforts of the government.

He said the fair would help citizens to better understand the direction of the government in regards to the work of LEAP which was focused on improving the lives of people living in poverty.

“We have added about 1.4 million people to the programme since 2017 and as you can see from the data displayed the number of households under the programme has increased from 213,044 in 2016 to 332, 200 in 2019,” he said.

Other interventions

The results of other priority programmes or interventions of the government such as the Planting for Food and Jobs under the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, the One District-one-Factory (1D1F) under the Ministry of Trade and Industry and the Ghana Card registration exercise by the National Identification Authority, under the Ministry of Communication, among others were also prominently exhibited at the fair.

For example, the Ministry of Trade and Industry exhibited that through the 1D1F initiative, had established 58 companies by September 2019 and created 10,983 direct and 43,900 indirect jobs, bringing to a total of 54,883 jobs.

The ministry also had on display some of the products manufactured by some of the companies operating under the initiative.

Under the Free Senior High School (FSHS) programme, the Ministry of Education exhibited that the policy had increased enrolment by 43 per cent between 2016 and 2018 with the number of beneficiaries projected to reach 1.2 million, cumulatively, in 2019.

Feedback

It is the expectation of the government that the fair would promote inclusive engagement and interactions between the public sector and the citizenry to promote evidence-based decision-making and improve accountability for results.

Speaking to Graphic Online on the sidelines of the event, a participant, Mr Abubakari Yakubu, who said he had travelled from Tamale for the event, said the fair had opened his eyes to the abundant interventions by the government to improve the lives of citizens.

He urged the government to replicate the fair in each of the 16 regions to help citizens grasp the direction of the government and support its efforts.

“If we know what is going on with the government, it’s better because we can offer ideas and support for what they are doing right so they should take it to the other parts of the country so that they can get everyone on board,” he said.

A student of the Accra Academy, Alex Obeng, who also spoke to Graphic Online, said he had come to the fair with other students to represent their school and was very impressed with the results showcased by the various ministries.

“Sometimes you don’t get to know what the government is doing if they don’t tell you so this is a good initiative by the government,” he said.