Decentralization to Lower Levels of Government and the Challenge of Basic Service Delivery in Papua New Guinea

Guest blog by Joseph Sumanop, Alois Walsamis, Cecilia Yamugara, Absalom Maenui, Preston Karue, John Kombiku  

There were many learnings derived from this course, the most important one being how to work in teams to solve a common problem. Throughout the course, we gained invaluable learnings from our teamwork and that will now shape the way we work, and these include: 

1. Importance of clearly defining problems and further de-constructing them as points of intervention to inform our stakeholder engagements. If we do not clearly define problems, it is impossible to engage relevant stakeholders to be interested enough or to care more to want to be involved to be part of a solution. 

2. Having engaged with stakeholders at various levels, it was interesting to note that most stakeholders were willing to engage by sharing information or be available to talk if they feel there was a genuine interest to achieve a mutually beneficial outcome. The challenge was in properly clarifying what it is we needed their support with so these stakeholders can see points of intervention where they can be involved. 

3. Whilst data was very important part of the learning, and that it is important to utilize accurate data when defining your problem, you can still use narratives to generally describe the state of problem and what the problem will look like once it is solved. 

4. We also learnt about the importance of expanding our change space, or clearly understanding the constraints of our change space, and what we can realistically achieve overtime through consistent and meaningful engagement. 

We worked on the problem of a lack of basic service delivery not reaching the people through the LLG Government system. We found out that the most important link in  the system were the people who needed to care more about their problem and demand greater accountability and transparency on use of development expenditures. 

We initially thought that the problem of basic service delivery not reaching the local constituents was because of a lack of bottom – up consultative development planning so that scarce resources are allocated based on community identified priorities. We eventually found out that this problem narrative suffered from a solution pitfall as we wrongfully assumed that a great plan could solve the problem of resource allocation based on priorities.  

The reality on the ground as we have learnt is that the Local Government Council Presidents who normally sit as part of the Board of the District Development Authority (“DDA”) always struggle to get their voices heard at the District or DDA level. This was because of political self – interest of the chairperson who is the elected member of parliament of Wewak district. With weak governance, transparency and accountability, it is easy to see how agendas and resolutions are bulldozed through at the DDA Board Level, and the LLG Presidents becoming mere spectators. 

As our result of our learnings, the group have now formed a 3-pronged approach as a way forward to support us as local leaders (inclusive of the 2 LLG Presidents in the team) on the ground: 

1. At Local level Government level– we have identified the need to secure the buy-in from the people (local constituents) and key stakeholders through consultative bottom-up planning processes by developing wards and LLG plans for the Boiken and Dagua LLGs of the Wewak district. It is  hoped that by having those plans developed and  shared publicly, there will be an increase in visibility and shared ownership of developments aspirations by the local constituents. 

2. At District and Provincial Level – we acknowledge that there are significant constraints through the DDA structure where political self – interest overrides genuine development aspirations of the community which can impact implementation of any well documented development plans. 

To manage this risk, we identified the need to push for the creation of the right type of incentives for the DDA Board Members (i.e. the LLG Presidents) to be motivated to do the right thing vs being comfortable with the status quo. This could be to empower the LLG Presidents to speak up and demand greater accountability at the DDA Board Level. For instance: 

1. Develop Incentive Programs – work with the East Sepik Governor’s Office to develop a program to publicly celebrate top-performing LLGs and /or LLG Presidents for those that are able to effectively implement their development plans, and consequently rewarding them with increased capabilities to do more good for more people. 

2. Mobilize Ward Councillors – increased engagements with ward councillors,  who hold power to elect the LLG Presidents, to ensure they are adequately trained and mobilised to demand greater accountability from each DDA BOD Member (i.e the LLG Presidents) on how development funds are expended through the DDA structure against set ward and LLG plans; and  

3. Improve Reporting and Enforcement of Laws Against Corruption – Increased engagement with Office of the Ombudsman Commission, Police Department and Public Prosecutor to improve reporting and enforcement of relevant legislation to eliminate issues of corruption at the DDA and LLG levels. 

3. At the National Level – work with key stakeholders to bring more visibility and accountability of development expenditure records and sharing that data with the local constituents or public in general to generate public interest and contribute  to increase in public demand for accountability on use of development funds against Ward and LLG Plans.  

We then develop the following potential ideas for Reform to pursue as part of our continued iterations: 

1. Ward/LLG Plan – Support the local leaders with ward and LLG planning and documentation. 

2. Incentive Programs for LLG Leaders – continued brainstorming of ideas on existing or potential incentive programs to equip LLG Presidents to encourage or compel the expected type of behaviour for good governance. 

3. Improve Engagement for Ward Councillors– Continue to look for ideas or advice on existing programs to mobilize ward councillors to take a more role in good goverance of DDAs by increasing demand accountability from LLG Presidents and DDAs in general. 

4. Improve Reporting and Enforcement – Seek opportunities on how Boiken Rural and Dagua LLGs can utilize existing partnerships (if any) between DPLLG and key stakeholders like Office of Ombudsman Commission, Royal Police Constabulary and Office of the Public Prosecutor to improve reporting and enforcement of relevant legislation to address issuess of corruption at the DDA and LLG Levels. 

5. Improve Public Visibility on Development Expenditure Records – Seek opportunities on how Boiken Rural and Dagua LLGs can utilize existing partnership (s) (if any) between Department of Provincial and Local Level Government Affairs and Department of Implementation Rural Development, National Fiscal Economic Commission or National Planning, etc on what development expenditure data can be obtained and shared with the local constituents of Dagua and Boiken LLGs and the public in general, to equip / empower the people to demand increased accountability on the way development funds are used. 

This approach has completely changed the way we tackle problems, by ensuring we properly understand the root cause of all problems whilst working in very constrained changes spaces, and the tools we learnt in the course were very practical in terms of helping us map out our stakeholders through the AAA change space analysis and seeing where we can work hard to increase our change space. 

Most of the tools we developed are practical that is applicable to our everyday work and will be used to help us become more focused and intentional about our engagements as we work through our interactions to solve the problem. These tools will be used to shape our way of working in teams to address common problems. 

Words of wisdom for fellow PDIA practitioners: 

1. Always know that your burdens are lighter when shared. 

2. People are more willing to engage and share ideas, solutions and data if they feel you share a genuine interest in a particular outcome that is mutually beneficial. 

3. Your biggest task will be to clarify the problem to the simplest element or root cause. Even if the first step looks like it is common sense, you will be surprised the amount of meaningful progress you can gain by completing that first step. 

4. Working as a team is more powerful that any other means of working to solve problems. 

This blog was written by participants who completed a 12-week PDIA for PNG online action-learning program from September – December 2022. 31 participants successfully completed this program.