Political Accountability Dilemma: Another Pandemic Post Covid-19?
Keywords:
Accountability; Governance; COVID-19; Political leadership; Stewardship theory.Abstract
In view of the unceasing global pandemic, centralized governments across the world have been put under the spotlight to account for all the provisions in the states they represent. Early 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic has dispersed worldwide with many repercussions, such as economic lockdown, that gave rise in important decline of international economic activities and gave escalation in social insecurity. This has disproportionally affected lot of countries if not all, leading to their citizen’s incapability to pay and maintain their necessities such as housing and further disrupted public services by government. This has called on to the government to provide basic services reliably and effectively. The study seeks to elevate a discussion on the need to address political accountability as it appears to be a massive dilemma in government. The study argues that the pandemic has created a conducive environment for lack of political accountability. Moreover, as a matter of urgency, accountability in governance should be re-evaluated, where more decisive actions should be taken to avoid another pandemic post COVID-19. The study adopted desk research method, the researcher used secondary data such as published report, books, previous studies, journal articles and other readily available materials to gain broad understanding of accountability dynamics. The study takes cognisance of the stewardship approach to broaden an understanding of accountability and political leadership. As remedy, the study calls for enforcement of harsh accountability mechanisms to avoid another pandemic post COVID-19.
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Copyright (c) 2023 Magatane Tshwarelo Mashilo, France Khutso Lavhelani Kgobe
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