LOCAL GOVERNMENT IN BRITISH GUIANA1
| Author | |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1002/j.1099-162X.1955.tb00113.x |
| Published date | 01 October 1955 |
| Date | 01 October 1955 |
192
JOURNAL
OF AFRICAN
ADMINISTRATION
which
they
expect to be provided for them,
rather
than
by themselves.
Even
minor local services provided
by
the
local authorities are regarded by the
majority
as
the
ultimate
responsibility of
the
central government, to which
they
have long been accustomed to look for
and
demand
every assistance in
improving
their
standard
of living.
With
improved
standards
of education,
it
is hoped
that
a sense
and
understanding of local governmental responsibilities
will develop,
and
that
the
time will come when participation in local government
councils
and
committees will be sought
after
purely for
the
opportunity
which
such participation offers of rendering public service
and
not
with
an eye to
enhanced local prestige, to
say
nothing of
the
allowances, which go with
the
office.
Thus
a
start
is being made in introducing
true
local government to
the
rural
areas of Nyasaland on a multi-racial basis,
and
also
the
process of integrating
the
inherent
and
traditional
authority
of chiefs
and
tribal elders with
the
initiative of
the
more advanced elements in
the
community
in a common
interest,
the
local government of
the
districts within
the
appropriate spheres of
administration. In this
the
provincial administration
at
present provides the
main initiative
and
on
the
district officers falls
the
task
of guiding
and
con-
trolling
the
early developments described, with
the
assistance of a local govern-
ment
school.
In
the
important
sphere of finance a
start
has been
made
through
the
forma-
tion of finance committees
and
the
imposition of local
taxation
has
started;
but
so far
the
stage of imposing a form of local
graduated
tax
has
not
been
reached.
While district councils are representative,
the
conception of election by
ballot is
not
generally understood.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT IN
BRITISH
GUIANA1
A note by the African Studies Branch
DR.
MARSHALL is one of a
not
very large
band
of practising local gover?-
ment
officers who
yet
take
the
whole of local government for
their
field. While
continuing as City Treasurer to manage
the
finances of Coventry, he has found
time
not
only to be President of his professional
Institute
of Municipal Treasurers
and
Accountants,
but
also to
study
on
the
spot
the
local government systems
of Germany,
the
Scandinavian countries,
and
America. In 1948 he extended
his studies to non-self-governing territories
and
produced areport on local
government in
the
Sudan." Here for
the
first time he came up against the
problems posed by
the
all-pervading influence of district commissioners and
chiefs
and
by
the
general
paternal
attitude
of
the
central government. Sub-
sequently he became amember of the Colonial Local Government Advisory
Panel
and
in
that
capacity he has been an
ante-natal
consultant for a dozen
local government ordinances in Africa
and
about
the same
number
outside
Africa.
Whatever
theories Dr. Marshall
may
have formed he does
not
obtrude
theIll
in this
report
on British
Guiana:
the
report is a common-sense down to
earth
document
that
deals with
the
particular conditions in British Guiana.
But
IDr.
A. H.
Marshall,
Report on Local Government in British Guiana,
Georgetown,
May,
1955,
(obtainable
from
Crown
Agents),
2s. 6d .. pp. 109.
2Published
by
McCorquodale
&Co.
(Sudan)
Ltd.,
Khartoum,
1949. See Journal
of
African
Administration, Vol. I,
No.4,
1949.
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