Use Credible Data to Improve policy Legislation –Dr. Draman urges MPs

Executive Director of Africa Centre for Parliamentary Affairs (ACEPA), Dr. Rasheed Draman, has charged Ghana’s Members of Parliament (MPs) and policy makers to use data and evidence information in making implementation of policies.

According to him, some government policies and programs often failed at the early implementation stages because most of the decisions are taken without adequate and credible data and evidence of facts.

Dr. Draman made the call at the opening ceremony of the 2022 Edition of the Parliamentary Data Fair on Tuesday, August 19, 2022.

He said evidence that includes information such as data, statistics, and rigorous studies could provide important insights that could improve the work of parliamentarians and the government’s performance.

Speaking on the theme, “Openness and Transparency: Promoting the use of credible Data and Evidence in the Parliament of Ghana.”Dr. Draman said parliamentarian and state agencies need sufficient data and evidence to inform their decisions.

Sufficient credible and reliable data, he noted would inform the government on the perennial floods and their associated effects, emphasizing that the nation could not properly tackle unemployment without data and that Ghana could not make progress in emotion-driving policies without data.

He added that a critical part of reaching and attaining the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) is to ensure that decision-makers use data and evidence to improve the performance of their policies and programs.

Dr. Draman said the Data Fair is very important as it would help bring MPs closer to the understanding of the importance of Data and evidence in their work, pointing out that, year in and year out most of the policies are not driven by any fact of data.

He said MPs have mandates to make laws and take a decision on behalf of the citizens, hence the need to use available and reliable data and evidence to help them, stating, “Lets laws, policy and decision be driven by data and evidence made available by institutions that produce the data.”

Evidence from research, Dr. Draman added could improve the legislative policy process, by identifying new issues for the guiding principle, informing decisions about policy content and direction, and evaluating the impact of policy.

He believed Parliament has a critical role to play in ensuring accountability by all state actors and policy implementation bodies and would need data and evidence to fully discharge its oversight responsibility effectively.

In that regard, he said quality is thus needed from the data producers and that could only be met if the data producers understand the work and operation of parliament.

First Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Hon Joseph Osei Owusu who spoke on behalf of the Speaker, Rt Hon Alban Bagbin said Parliament would continue to explore practical avenues for improving data and evidence used in the performance of its mandate.

He said the IDRIG event has come to augment the already effort to promote coordination, sharing, and use of data products among the various data producers within parliament and as well promote transparency, engender trust, motivate, and accelerate access to research data for better decision-making in parliament.

The Minority Leader in Parliament, Hon Haruna Iddrisu commended ACEPA and Parliament for organizing the Data fair which in his view remains a critical component of information for MPs.

He said most often than not some MPs debate on figures without giving Data and credible evidence of facts to back them, a phenomenon he believed would be reduced with the effort of ACEPA and the Parliament Research Department.

According to him, the Parliamentary Services Board has approved a budget for the networking of Broadband for parliament to be connected to the internet as part of policies to enhance its research.

While admitting that the credibility and reliability of Data is an important issue in enhancing the work of legislators, Mr. Iddisu believed with time and the continued advocacy championed by institutions like ACEPA and GSS, MPs would come to accept and appreciate the importance and values of data in their work.

The Data Fair brought together both public and private sector actors working within the data and evidence ecosystem, to showcase their work and promote the various sources of data/information/evidence available to Members of Parliament.

Some of the stakeholders include but are not limited to the Ghana Statistical Service, ACEPA, Centre for Democratic Development Ghana (CDD-Ghana), selected Ministries, development partners, academia and Parliament’s own information units.

A combination of physical exhibition and virtual streaming of exhibits including videos and documentaries, and other activities were employed at the Fair.

The objective of this year’s Data Fair, among other things, is to highlight the significance of verifiable evidence, especially statistical data and other types of evidence in supporting parliament’s performance of its oversight mandate including MPs’ oversight of the Government’s implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals.

Parliamentary researchers, librarians, committee clerks, and other staff who are responsible for providing evidence to decision-makers need to be able to easily access, interpret and use data to answer MPs’ questions and prepare reports and analyses to inform committee oversight of the government.

The MPs need to be able to see the status of key indicators such as health, education, and infrastructure in their constituencies so that they can represent their needs.

Data for Accountability will help Parliament to oversee the implementation of the SDGs in Ghana, by providing the evidence needed to monitor progress and advocate better for their constituencies.

In addition to supporting Parliament’s oversight of SDG progress, the project aims to strengthen.