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The Oil Journey: Following the oil money in Ghana

Infosol Technologies

Project theme Citizen engagement and voice  Citizen-generated data  Civil society monitoring  Mobile apps  Technologies for transparency and accountability 



Project type Innovation 



Country Ghana 



Support £37,560



Country Engagement Developer Sachibu Mohammed



“Citizens in Ghana are unaware of how oil revenues are spent in their communities leading to most of the projects being abandoned or funds misallocated.” — Infosol

70%

Of oil revenues in Ghana should be used for economic and social development.

Start date
November 2015 End date
February 2017
Period: 16 months

Issue

In 2007, oil in commercial quantities was discovered off Ghana's southern coast, providing Ghana the opportunity to develop socially and economically.

To avoid the pitfalls of other petroleum-rich countries, Ghana implemented the Petroleum Revenue Management Act, which required the publication of revenues and payments, mandating public access to information. But, despite the existence of the act, there has been little engagement of citizens in how revenues are spent, and a lack of transparency among government reporting agencies, means that Ghana is in danger of repeating some of the cycles of corruption and financial mis-management seen in many other oil-producing countries in the region.

Project

The Infosol team wants to stimulate citizen participation in tracking how oil revenues are generated and spent. One way of doing this, is a platform where people can find development projects within their community. They can review and rate how well the projects are performing, highlight issues of corruption and demand accountability by incentivizing local authorities to engage with them on the issues raised.

The project involves local communities in mapping out the development projects. Interaction with the platform is linked to an app through which users receive updates on all projects funded through oil revenue. Through Interactive Voice Response, citizens can get voice messages on all projects that are taking place in their selected communities, in various local languages.

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Partner

Infosol Ghana is an IT company in Ghana that builds web and mobile applications for Ghanaian companies. It has a social wing that implements various social initiatives to help ensure transparency and equality in Ghana.

This project is implemented in partnership with the Oil and Gas Civil Society forum, Imani Ghana and ACEP in incentivizing citizens and the government at local and national level to engage on issues of oil revenue.

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