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News from 2019-09-19 / KfW Development Bank
KfW Development Bank promotes the construction of town halls
After 30 years of interruption: local elections in Togo successful
On 18 September, a financing agreement for EUR 8 million was signed in Lomé, Togo. These funds are utilised to finance around 30 town halls in newly created municipalities that have not had the infrastructure needed to perform the administrative tasks assigned to them and offer the respective services. This is the third phase of KfW's decentralisation programme – in the previous phases, marketplaces were built and renovated, the municipal staff provided by the government were trained and a citizen monitoring system with SMS surveys was developed.
In future, citizens will be able to take advantage of civil register services (personal register, issuing of identity cards, registration of births, marriages, etc.) in the place they live. The elected municipal representatives can perform their duties in suitable rooms with the necessary equipment. In the medium term, the municipalities can base their planning on reliable population statistics and expand their income base through local tax registers and fees.
In 2016, Togo adopted a roadmap for decentralisation and with it an important approach to democratisation: a total of 117 municipalities were created comprised of 12 districts in Lomé, 21 existing municipalities and 84 new, predominantly rural municipalities. The population has high expectations regarding better access to public services and increased political participation.
In the next step, an architectural competition will be held, after which the municipalities – and the locations in the municipalities – where construction is scheduled to begin will be selected. The town hall model is intended to give a “Togolese face” to high functional and environmental requirements.
