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Political-administrative interactions in local governments have gained wide attention
among most development practitioners and scholars of public administration. Politicaladministrative
relations focus on the interaction and reciprocal relations between the
elected and appointed officials in performing local governments’ functions. Through
decentralization by devolution “D by D”, local governments have been mandated to
provide social services within their jurisdictions such as education, health, and clean and
safe water, among others. Implementation of construction of health and infrastructures
projects is one of the strategy used by local governments to ensure effective provision of
health and education services. Despite the efforts made by the government to construct
health and education infrastructures quality and adequacy of physical infrastructures of
health and education remain a challenge. The overall objective of this study was to assess
the contribution of political-administrative interactions to implementation of construction
of health and education infrastructure projects (classrooms, teachers’ houses, latrines,
laboratories, dispensaries and health centres) in Morogoro District Council, Morogoro
Region in Tanzania. The study specifically: (i) assessed the levels of interaction between
elected and appointed officials (ii) examined attitudes between elected and appointed
officials in the projects; (iii) analysed adherence to the principles of governance between
elected and appointed officials in projects implementation, and (iv) examined the
contribution of the interaction between elected and appointed officials in construction of
health and education projects in Morogoro District. The study adopted a case study
research design, and involved a total of 64 respondents that included elected and
appointed officials who were randomly selected. Qualitative data were collected through
Focus Group Discussions (FGD), Key Informant Interviews (KIIs) and observation
techniques while quantitative data were collected using a questionnaire survey.
Qualitative data were analysed through content analysis and categorised based on the
research objectives. Quantitative data were analysed using IBM Statistical Package for
Social Science (SPSS) Software by computing descriptive statistics employing
frequencies, percentages, means and standard deviations. An interaction index was also
computed. The results from the interaction index revealed that there was moderate
interaction (65.6%) between the elected and appointed officials in implementation of
public development projects in Morogoro District Council. About one-fifth (20.3%) of the
respondents had low interactions while 14.1% had high interaction. On attitude, the
results indicated that 56.2% of respondents had negative attitude while 12.6% had
indifferent attitude and 31.2% had positive attitude towards their relationship in
implementation of the projects. It was, further, found that there was poor transparency at
68.8% and accountability (65.2%) between the elected and appointed officials in
implementation of projects, particularly on financial matters. The findings also showed
that the elected officials were not adhering to the rule of law compared to the appointed
officials; instead they were influenced by their political interests and partisan politics and
ignorance on the laws, policies and regulations. The findings indicated that good
relationship between elected and appointed officials facilitated mobilization of project
resources, increased public participation, improved trust, minimised conflict of interest
and ensured transparency and accountability in the projects. However, the study revealed
various challenges that affected their relationship in the projects. The challenges included
difference in the levels of education, distrust and conflicting interests, partisan and
political interference, and poor transparency and accountability. With regard to the results
of objectives one and two, it is concluded that inadequate monitoring of relationships
between elected and appointed officials in implementation of development projects by
local government leads to moderate interaction and increases misunderstandings. From
the results that meet objective three, it is concluded that lack of transparency,
accountability and adherence to the rule of law among elected and appointed officials
jeopardizes compliance with governance principles in implementation of the projects. In
regard to the results on contribution to projects, it is concluded that positive relationships
between elected and appointed officials contributes much to effective implementation of
the said projects in the study area. Based on the conclusion drawn on the interaction
between elected and appointed officials, it is recommended that local government should
regularly conduct trainings on policies, regulations, and demarcation and monitoring of
officials’ interaction in implementation of development projects. In view of the
conclusion drawn from objective three, it is recommended that Morogoro District Council
should monitor adherence to governance practices among both elected and appointed
officials and provide trainings on policies, rule of law, and conducts that govern their
relations. It is also recommended that local governments should encourage collaborations
and partnerships between elected and appointed officials as advocated by complementary
model of political-administrative relations. Moreover, it is recommended that local
governments, through their own sources, should establish monthly allowances to
village/hamlet chairpersons and other elected officials. This will improve morale and
accountability of the elected officials to effectively implement development projects |
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