Assessing the Impact of Local Government Substructures on Internally Generated Fund of Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies in Ghana

Of late, transfers from Central Governments to the local governments are irregular and dwindling particularly in the developing countries. However, these local governments are expected to fulfil their mandate of executing development projects within their areas of jurisdiction. As such, the major purpose of this study was to assess the Internally Generated Funds (IGF) mobilization by Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies substructures in Greater Accra. A sample of 130 respondents was chosen using purposive sampling. Primary data was collected using key informant interview guide. Analysis of data involved thematic and trend analysis. The study found that IGF contribution of the MMDAs substructures to the Assemblies was encouraging, metropolitan contributes much revenue as compared to the districts. In addition, locking up of businesses that do not pay tax, use of taskforce, division of various revenue collection sources and persuasion emerged as the crucial strategies of revenue mobilization. It was equally found that the key challenges to IGF mobilization of the substructures were inadequate staff capacity, limited staff motivation, unfortunate attitudes of revenue collectors/taxpayers, weak revenue collection systems, limited education on the uses of the revenue and recognition of the revenue collectors. Overall, in spite of the challenges encountered, the revenue mobilized has being on a marginal rise. Consequently, it is recommended that the institution of staff capacity building programs, recruitment of more revenue collectors who are motivated, the education of the public on need to pay tax and making sub-structure operational are crucial steps towards improving revenue collection by the MMDA substructure