This past week, remuneration for office holders in Neighbourhood Democratic Councils (NDCs) and Regional Democratic Councils (RDCs) has been increased.
The existing allowances were embarrassingly low and was insufficient to cover even taxi fares to attend meetings. For example, NDC Councillors received $3,000 per month. This will now be raised to $30,000; that’s a 10-fold increase.
RDC councillors moved from $30,000 to $50,000 with higher stipends for Chair and Vice-Chairs. These are significant increases, in absolute terms.
This had to be so, because over many decades these allowances were either not increased at all or increased by a pittance a piece. In essence, the increases are already dated, though announced just a few days ago.
What I am saying is, given the extant realities, the increases are not nearly enough, but the process has to start somewhere and this is a good start. Minister Manickchand, President Ali and whomever else worked on this should be commended. I hope some form of retroactivity is attached to it. I also hope that annual increases are built in, perhaps together with annual public sector salary increases or a separate regime. The facts of the increases passed under the radar and barely made it in the news rounds or commanded any significant social media space or attention.
The idea of paying a negligible stipend to NDC and RDC councillors stems from the fact that the legislative arm of our government is considered a part-time vocation. So, an assemblyman is required to have a regular day job and treat matters of the Assembly as part time, incidental and administratively non-involved.
For example, that explains why the terms of compensation for Judges and Executive Administrators (the other two co-equal arms of government) are astronomical when compared to ordinary MPs.
Each of our 70 NDCs and 10 RDCs have faced significant increases in the number of residents, increased households, increased square kilometres of roadways, higher number of drains and gutters to maintain, higher number of businesses and rapidly changing community lifestyles.
Dovetail that with an ever-increasingly knowledgeable population with greater reliance on newer technological advances, the system brakes under the growth in demand for services that are increasingly unable to be met by part-time councillors. No longer are Mayors and NDC chairpersons able to serve as part-time officers. The modern structure of our economy and society demands their attention and occupation on a full-time basis.
In fact, the practical functioning of local government management is hybridised. This hybrid system manifest itself in two scenarios. In local government organs where the majority is held by the ruling party, there is usually a better synchronisation between the designated clerks of council and their respective Chairs. In that scenario the chair is effectively the chief administrator of the council.
The Clerks and REOs generally show deference to the Chairs on administrative matters. However, in scenarios where councils have opposition majorities, many clashes between council chairs and their clerks are not unfamiliar occurrences. This is so because, clerks of council perform executive functions and are essentially the government’s administrator on the council. That means whenever the wishes of the council (or the Chair) clash with the wishes of the government, the clerk, of necessity, must assert his or her executive authority under the law and do not defer or cede an administrative ambit to the Chair.
Regardless of the scenario in whichever constituency, whenever constituents have concerns, as a matter of course they do not seek out the clerks of council, they seek out the Chairs and Councillors who then need to garner resources to meet the needs of their constituencies.
The current legal structure is outdated and begging for reform. A lot of it may require constitutional change, so I will divert the rest of this discussion. The modern demands placed on Parliament, RDCs and NDCs are not as they used to be in decades gone by. We should move to full-time parliamentarians, full-time RDC and NDC Chairs and Vice-Chairs. Their monthly remuneration should also reflect this reality.
In this constitutional scenario, we should have a complete separation of legislature and executive. In that, the president and his ministers should not be required to be in parliament, their functions should be wholly administrative. Except for the Prime Minister and one other person, (say a deputy Prime Minister), MPs should not be ministers.
In that way, their compensation package should be on par with the executive and they should hold office full time and have access to a fully functional secretariat. Under the current model, the constituents are underserved and underrepresented, many MPs can hardly read a bill or has the wherewithal to research and critically examine and meaningfully contribute to the emergence and development of laws.
Apart from the occasional dunce and dim-witted MP or councillor, the system itself breathes free loathing and promotes political shallowness.
Further, under a redesigned constitution, RDC and NDC chairs become executive heads and clerks become creatures of the council. The Local Government Commission should be merged with, or, become an appendage to the Public Service Commission, in its current form, it is prone to dysfunctionality.
The local councils must learn and reclaim their by-law making function. This is an aspect of NDC and RDC council life that has been lost almost entirely. Most of the work of a typical council deals with administrative type decisions but yet its head does not have executive powers. The constitution should give more life and meaning to the hybrid function the local democratic organs actually perform.