Government embarks on week-long service delivery campaign

Beginning today for the next five days, the Ministry of Local Government in partnership with several civil service organisations linked to service delivery will embark on a countrywide service delivery campaign in all the country’s 30 districts. The five-day campaign will be carried out in partnership with Ministry of Public Service and Labour, Ministry of Health, Rwanda Governance Board, Rwanda Development Board, Rwanda Utilities and Regulatory Authority, Public Service Commission and the Private Sector Federation. The campaign comes as an intervention against the status of deficient service delivery and unsatisfactory customer care in the private and public sectors and has been an issue of concern during the two last National Leadership Retreats. Concerned institutions were tasked to address the issue. The campaign seeks to monitor and build awareness on high quality service delivery in the public service. Improved Service Delivery has previously been mentioned as one of the drivers of economic growth towards the achievement of the Country’s Vision 2020 and EDPRS 2. Prof Shyaka Anastase, the Chief Executive Officer of Rwanda Governance Board said that through the campaign, they would be looking to build accountable governance and increase the level of service satisfaction. “Good service provision is part of good governance, hence our involvement. We want to increase the level of service satisfaction to about 80 per cent. People served in the public offices should get quality services that they will appreciate. Currently we are struggling to attain 70 per cent of client satisfaction.” He noted the campaign’s necessity in all areas in the country as some areas had registered very low client satisfaction. He said that this week’s campaign would precede a campaign in March that will target the private sector. “Improving service delivery speeds up the country’s development rate as citizens require quality service for them to be productive in their respective fields.” Fred Mufuruki, the Director General of Terrestrial Administration and Governance at the Ministry of Local Governance said that Rwanda being a country dependent on service as one of the key resources, there was need to step up the level of service delivery. “Our economy is dependent on service provision, to develop it we have to ensure that we provide quality and timely services. We have to ensure that the services we deliver meet international standards. We have decided to embark on a campaign to sensitize the population on the value of service delivery. We have mobilized service providers and service seekers so that they all understand that services are the basis of our nation’s development. There is need for everyone to understand that we can not develop at the rate we want to if services are not delivered well. He said that a similar campaign would be carried out March in the private sector and also done more frequently to have a greater impact. “This is just the beginning; we are looking to have the campaign carried out every quarter. In this case we will use client charters, we will look to see if they a re implemented as they have been set. Starting March we will focus on the private sector as well as come up with new and different strategies to make sure we deliver quality services. We can not assume that it will be done once and achieve immediate impact, it is something that will done every four months by different institutions. We will also mobilize people to create awareness on the importance of service delivery.” He added that service delivery is an obligation and not a favour to clients. “If you are in the private sector and do not deliver, your enterprise can not grow, if you are in public sector and do not provide quality and timely services, you o not qualify to hold the position and responsibility.” Explaining the model to be used during the campaign, Chairperson of the Technical Committee, Solange Uwizeye said that every district is covered by the campaign in two days. “The first day is reserved for the monitoring component within the organization and second day will be for awareness building that will involve members of the public. We will have deliberations with the various service providers to exchange ideas on how they can improve their services, find out challenges they face and propose solutions to the challenges.” The monitoring an awareness building will be done by a team of 45 officials from the participating organizations who will be spread out to the 30 districts. She said that the success of the campaign would be evaluated using the set objectives which include, raise public awareness on benefits of quality service delivery, monitoring and sensitize the service providers and providing actionable recommendations to be implemented. “The goal of the campaign is the improvement of services at the local level for the citizens and to investigate the real status of service delivery, the major gaps in service delivery provision and challenges faced by local entities in delivering services.” The first day of the campaign features Kamonyi, Ruhango, Ngororero, Nyarugenge, Gasabo, Kayonza and Kicukiro districts.