Act Now! is raising concerns about funds managed by the District Development Authorities. Photo: RNZI / Johnny Blades
In Papua New Guinea, the national government channels many millions of kina to the local level government sector to cover basic health, education and infrastructure services.
The scheme has been running for about ten years - established in 2014 - with 96 District Development Authorities (DDAs) established to manage funding of what is, since last year, 20 million kina each, per annum.
But the watchdog group Act Now! is raising concerns about the management of this money.
Spokesperson for Act Now!, Eddie Tanago Paine, said there is a lack of plans, a lack of publicly available documents, showing the people how this money has been spent.
"People are supposed to know how they're going to be benefiting from these public monies. There is a lack of proper planning at the district level...undermining the service delivery at the very heart of the population," Tanago Paine said.
The money is to provide basic services in health, education and infrastructure, but only seven of the 96 DDAs have filed the Five Year Plans that are publicly available. Another 14 have launched plans but these, as yet, are not open to public scrutiny.
The five year period runs in conjunction with PNG's national elections, so these plans should have been submitted soon after the election in 2022.
"There is no accountability in terms of providing acquittals, providing audits...so this is very, very concerning," he said.
Act Now! has established a website, DDA Watch, with the aim of improving access and accountability.
Tanago Paine said "if you know how and what's going to happen to your money, that's when you will be asking why things are not happening."
He said if there is no transparency and accountability then it is the people who suffer.
"It's been going on for a while and we've taken it as it's normal.
"[But] it's not normal. It's not normal, and we want everybody to be demanding, and part of the contribution as an organisation is ensuring that these DDAs are transparent, accountable."