Municipal and District Planning Officers in the Upper East Region, on Tuesday expressed concern about the way some District and Municipal Chief Executives abandon district plans and instead try to implement their own. They alleged that the assemblies spent ample time gathering data, holding discussion with stakeholders, including Assembly Members and the chief executives who were expected to make their contributions. According to them, some of the chief executives deliberately failed to attend district meetings and in the end they put aside the broad consensus reached so as to carry out their personal plans. The planning officers expressed these concerns at an advocacy seminar on integrating population variables into District Development Planning, organized by the Regional Population Council and held in Bolgatanga. They noted that such attitude also often tends to be seen when the DCE or MCE was changed and/or reshuffled and the new officer refuses to work with the existing plans and proposals. Mr Philip Yinbil, Deputy Regional Economic Planning Officer, who presided over the function, said excuses of lack of funds made by Assemblies also delayed the officers from gathering data and following the right steps to come out with a good plan for the assembly. This he explained saying: “When this happens, the DCE or MCE will at the last minute, when the Coordinating Council is demanding for the plans, just insist that the Planning and Budget Officers come out with a plan to meet the deadline and when they rush, they only come out with an academic work and not a good practical plan”. The planning officers appealed to new District and Municipal Chief Executives to show interest and participate in the process of drawing up plans so as to avoid making unnecessary changes. They also appealed to the Assemblies to provide them with computers for their work and cameras so that they could have pictures along side their reports. Mr Alosibah Azam, Regional Population Officer, underscored the importance of statistics on the population of districts and regions and noted that it was a resource for development. He appealed to the Ghana Statistical Service to endeavour to analyze the population data they gather in good time so that it could be used for all development plans for the country. Mr Azam said development had to be based on critical analysis of the population dynamics of the country so that plans would be drawn to address the needs of the people. He said it was rather unfortunate that integrating population into development planning was often sacrificed on the altar of political expediency as political appointees at the district level wanted to carry out projects that would earn them praise and please certain people. Mr Azam suggested that Municipal and District Assemblies set aside some funds to carry out small-scale surveys to collect and analyze data for planning. Source: GNA