Patching up decentralization to boost the service delivery

Riyadi Suparno The Jakarta Post/Jakarta

There were many positive changes to local democracy in 2005, especially the direct elections of regional heads, but too often this did not translate into the improved delivery of services. Therefore, the challenge for 2006 will be to help our burgeoning local democracy improve the delivery of services, especially to the poor.

Why does improving services to the poor matter? Poverty does not mean just a lack of income, but also a lack of access to services that would benefit the poor more than any other group, such as education, health services, clean water and sanitation.

As fighting poverty has been declared one of the main priorities of the central government, improving service delivery to the poor should be the guiding principle of any local government.

Eradicating poverty by improving the poor's access to basic services would not only meet the government's long-term target, but also the Millennium Development Goals, which is a commitment by countries to ensure all citizens have access to basic services.

Therefore, it is imperative that we focus on improving service delivery to the poor. But how?

Strengthening democracy at the local level by introducing direct elections of heads of local governments, i.e. governors, regents and mayors, has in some ways helped improve service delivery.

When the people get the right candidates for regent, for example, and they select the best one, many times they get better public services almost immediately.

Immediately after his election as regent of Jembrana, Bali, for example, I Gede Winasa introduced free basic education and health services for people; services that are still uncommon in the more than 400 regencies and municipalities across the country. His wife, Ratna Ani Lestari, who later won the regency election in Banyuwangi, East Java, also introduced similar services there.

The commitment and creativity of regents or mayors to find more efficient and effective ways to provide services to the poor is equally important. This has worked out in some places.

In Polewali Mandar, South Sulawesi, for example, having households participate in the management of schools, according to the World Bank, has improved the effectiveness and responsiveness of the education system in serving the poor. In Pemalang, Central Java, vouchers given to women give them increased access to prenatal health services.

In these cases, democracy has given people the chance to select good candidates for regent or mayor, who in return provide them better services. However, many times it does not always work this way, simply because the system of decentralization is still patchy.

Therefore the system of decentralization needs complementary regulations or institutions, or may even require some changes in areas already in place to make it more responsive to the demands of the people, especially the poor.

One such measures should be the establishment of minimum standards of public service. Although this has been mandated by the Decentralization Law, such standards are practically nonexistent, meaning the people -- as the users of public services -- cannot judge whether the services provided by local governments are up to standard.

Nevertheless, there is some heartening news coming from the House of Representatives: It is now deliberating the much-awaited public services bill, which covers the issue of minimum standards, even as far as the introduction of a Britain-style "Citizen Charter", i.e. a kind of detailed pledge by local governments to provide better services for the people, with clear targets and time frames.

Such minimum standards and citizen charters must be published so that the people, especially the poor, can monitor whether local governments perform, in terms of carrying out their public duties.

Another area that needs to be strengthened is the adoption of performance budgeting by local governments, which is mandated by the Public Finance Law.

Unlike traditional budgeting, which is more concerned with input than output, performance budgeting cares more about output, and sets performance indicators and targets for all budget items.

However, even with performance budgeting, public service standards or Citizen Charters in place, if there is no meaningful system of accountability, they will not deliver the fruits of decentralization, but rather serve as nothing more than useless ornaments.

Therefore, the system of accountability at the local level needs to be strengthened. Currently, local governments are accountable to local people more than to the central government through local legislative councils, or DPRD. Too often, however, local councillors do not have the capacity to do oversight, especially in areas that require specific knowledge and skills, such as looking into the books of local governments.

In this case, our system of decentralization has a serious defect, i.e. in the auditing of the books of local governments. Unless the books are audited by an independent party, whose results would be made available to the public or at least to the DPRD, corruption at the local level will continue.

To address this issue, the Decentralization Law, which was amended five years after implementation, will need another revision, especially to accommodate the issue of audits.

To make the system of decentralization complete, we need to empower local people so that they can do their part in overseeing the performance of local governments.

Empowering the people can be pursued through various ways, including by educating them about the importance of demanding their rights with regards to public services, so that they can demand or even punish local governments when service delivery is below par.

The practices in Morowali and Pemalang are a good example of local governments empowering the people by directly involving them in public services.

When such practices become more prevalent, and the patchy parts of the decentralization system are already fixed, we can be sure that service delivery to the poor will improve, and we can be sure that we will be better off as a nation.