A non governmental organization, Renaissance Care and Empowerment Foundation (RECEF) has admonished Kogi state government needs to prove to her citizens that its governance system is all inclusive aimed at promoting citizen participation in decision making.
In a statement signed by its Executive Director, Idris Ozovehe Muraina, RECEF called on Kogi state government to urgently initiate processes to sign up to Open Government Partnership (OGP) to cement her achievement thus far in fiscal transparency and accountability.
RECEF assured Kogi state government that OGP guarantees a corrupt-free and peaceful society.
The organization added that Kogi state government has over the last few years made significant gains towards achieving transparency in governance, especially with the openness in the state budgeting processes.
“The Open Government Partnership (OGP) is a multilateral initiative that aims to secure concrete commitments from national and sub-national governments to promote open government, empower citizens, fight corruption, and harness new technologies to strengthen governance.
“In the spirit of multi-stakeholder collaboration, OGP is overseen by a steering committee including representatives of governments and civil society organizations.
“Open government reforms have in recent years emerged as an area of intense activity and fervent hope for some of our largest societal aspirations: to improve public services, to expand public knowledge of governmental processes, to save public money, and to make government more participatory and inclusive.
“OGP provides a platform for reformers inside and outside of governments around the world to develop initiatives that promote transparency, empower citizens, fight corruption and harness new technologies to strengthen governance.
“OGP aims to secure concrete commitments from national and sub-national governments that drive open government reform and innovation in an effort to push countries further in the areas of transparency, accountability, and citizen engagement.
“Nigeria as a country signed up to this lofty initiative July, 2016 and thus far had reported progress on the following areas: Fiscal transparency, Government integrity, Access to information, Extractive resources transparency, Public participation and Open data. It is a voluntary partnership that national and sub- national opt to join and through which civil society organizations, in collaboration with government, can advance initiatives that they deem in line with their reform agendas.
“As at today in Nigeria, 16 states had signed up to this initiative aimed at concretizing their achievement in their fight against corruption and ensuring citizen participation in governance,” the statement read.
RECEF noted that with accolades from international organizations and high rating in fiscal transparency and accountability, it is time for the state to cement her achievement in open government initiative and place herself among communities of Open Government Partnership (OGP).
