Where did SADA go wrong?

AS I wrote this piece my heart was bleeding. Angry voices blurred from my little radio set. I could hear a gentleman from a civil society group in Tamale swearing fire and brimstone should President John Mahama not axe Dr Charles Jebuni, who has been asked to act as Chief Executive Officer for the Savannah Accelerated Development Authority (SADA) following the exit of Alhaji Gilbert Iddi.

 

In 2010, the enthusiasm was at a crescendo as the SADA Law (Act 805, 2010) was passed and subsequently inaugurated to begin work. There had been so much rhetoric about the need for the establishment of a body to spearhead an agenda to quicken the pace of development in the north.

 

So the goose to lay the golden eggs was finally hatched and it became a popular refrain, particularly from politicians, that SADA would offer a quick fix to the problems of the north, such as unemployment, poor road networks, ailing agriculture, environmental degradation, high illiteracy, name them.

 

So what went wrong? What has happened to all the expectations and promises? How could a beautiful initiative suddenly go bad?

In the last two years, SADA has received so much bad publicity and its reputation has been seriously compromised. Complaints about failed projects, incompetent leadership and questionable contractual agreements have continued to mar the image of a unique institution that has failed to win the confidence of the people it is mandated to serve.

 

We do not need to dig deep to find these answers and I hope another consultant would not be paid to diagnose and prescribe solutions to SADA’s self-inflicted paralyses.

 

As a journalist who has followed closely SADA from preconception to take-off, my little post-mortem reveals that SADA failed due to the following reasons.

 

The rule of the few

I call it the rule of the few because SADA’s ideas were basically sourced and credited to a few ‘scholars’ close to the President and they made sure they suffocated him with their ‘best’ ideas and did not allow for adequate pool of ideas and consultation.

 

At many of their consultation forums, all they did was to tell the participants what they ‘the experts’ intended to do to save the rest of those in the north and then seek their approval in an atmosphere that did not allow for more ideas to be brought on board.

 

Failed Projects

Why would the reforestation project not fail? I agree that desertification is approaching the northern savannah due to activities such as increased logging, bush burning, land degradation, mining activities, among others.

 

But come to think of it, was the solution simply to plant trees. Did SADA not know about the numerous failed reforestation projects and what lessons did they draw from it.

 

How were the communities involved in this project? Did they own the plantlets and were they committed to supervising these plants to grow. Were the chiefs or assembly men playing any lead roles? What about the development needs of the people? Did they say tree planting was their priority at that moment and how well do they appreciate the value of trees.

 

How about the much-maligned guinea fowl project? How much efforts was put into bringing guinea fowl farmers (real ones, I mean) to sit and discuss this project, provide their inputs and participate actively from the conception to take-off.

 

Were guinea fowl farmers eager about the project? You see, when people do not feel any attachment, hope or sense of ownership to a project supposedly targeting them, the project is already doomed.

 

The successes of any project are reflected in the demeanour and wellbeing of the beneficiaries and they are the best persons to spread the good news. So are there any people sharing the good news of SADA’s projects. Who are they and how many.

Poor communication

What even amazed me was the poor communication from SADA. When the agitations gained momentum and Alhaji Gilbert Iddi, the then CEO, begun to feel the heat, he made strenuous efforts to rescue his image, but it was a total disaster.

 

Alhaji Iddi was simply helpless as people kept asking “where are the guinea fowls?” He could not explain effectively the partnership with Asongtaba, how it came about, why the huge costs and what the prospects were for such an investment. He was simply drowned as he tried catching at a straw.

 

Desperate to save his reputation, he resorted to carrying journalists from place to place showing them supposed successful projects (some of which were not initiatives of SADA, such as the butternut and guinea fowl project).      

 

At a point I was wondering whether SADA had no communication officer to coordinate its communication and why Alhaji Iddi was trying to be everywhere in the media explaining and confusing Ghanaians the more.

 

I was informed that an experienced journalist had been appointed the communication manager, but that he was based in Accra and rarely visited the project areas.

 

It is important to state that communication is not only useful during crisis, it is crucial from planning stage, take-off to end of project. It is also not limited to media engagement. Such projects require a lot of participatory development communication activities to deepen understanding, stimulate a sense of ownership and participation and ensure sustainability.

 

Waste of resources

It appears to me that a lot of funds given to SADA have been committed to non-intervention expenditure and not on the supposed development interventions.  These include paying of consultants and office personnel (some of whom are virtually not working), buying cars, furnishing office space, paying allowances for travels and so on.

 

I think a lot of prudence should have been exercised in the expenditure of SADA from the beginning. Mr President, what were the parameters you gave Alhaji Iddi in terms of spending.

 

A different approach could have helped

So what could have been done better? I am not an economist or development practitioner, but a Ghanaian with a viewpoint, however nonsensical it may sound.

 

I think SADA could have started on a better note by pooling ideas across board, building consensus, stimulating a sense of ownership and letting the people feel they are directing the focus of SADA.

 

For instance, SADA could have organised open forums in the regions to seek the views of the people on what are their priorities and to indicate the problems they think need attention first.

 

It would have been appropriate too for SADA to have instituted a dialogue platform where various stakeholders agree on how SADA should progress and to keep reviewing SADA’s operations periodically. Let us remember always that SADA is not a private company to be left in the hands of the board and management alone.

 

Such a platform would have had various governmental institutions and private enterprises who would discuss a number of programmes they are pursuing or intend to implement which could lead to the transformation of the north.

 

SADA’s role would be to help in prioritising these programmes and explore funding avenues to execute these programmes. For instance, SADA cannot build roads, but SADA can work with the roads ministry to prioritise key road networks in the north and secure funding to execute these road projects.

 

Such dialoguing promotes transparency and ensures that everyone gets on board.

I am not privy to what the President is doing to revitalize SADA, but I hope it is really for the best. I would keep watching and hoping for the best, although with teary eyes. It is not too late to redirect this development vehicle.

 

End.