Lomé
Togo
06 Nov, 2014
Communique
- The Permanent Committee of the Board of Governors of the African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF) on Resource Mobilization held its first meeting in Lomé, Togo on 4-5 November 2014. The meeting was chaired by Prof. Kako NUBUKPO, Minister in the Office of the President, in charge of Long-Term Planning and Evaluation of Public Policies, and Chair of the Committee;
- Five of the six member countries of the Committee, namely South Africa, Mali, Nigeria, Senegal and Togo were represented at the Lomé meeting. Rwanda, the sixth member States of the Committee was not represented at the inaugural meeting;
- Other high-level officials in attendance at the opening include the Minister of Administrative Reforms and State Modernization, Mr. Eliott OHIN; Minister of Justice, Mr. Koffi ESAW; Minister of State of the Ministry of Justice in charge of Relations with Institutions of the Republic, Mr. Christian TRIMUA and the Ambassador of France to Togo, H.E. Mr. Marc FONBAUSTIER. Other organizations represented were: African Development Bank, GIZ, Central Bank of West African States, the French Agency for Development, UNDP, ECOWAS Bank for Investment and Development and the Development Bank of West Africa;
- The meeting started with introductory remarks by Prof. Emmanuel Nnadozie, the ACBF Executive Secretary, who explained the context of the creation of the Committee and the importance of its mission, and underlined the unanimous confidence placed on Togo by Governors, during their 23rd Annual Meetings held in Dakar, Senegal, in June 2014, to lead the Committee in its important mission for Africa. Following Prof. NNADOZIE’s remarks, the delegates listened attentively to the opening speech of the Chair of the Committee, Prof. Kako NUBUKPO who, before declaring the debates open, reminded the participants of the importance of capacity building for African countries as they move through various stages of the transformation of their economies, and the decisive steps Africa should take to play a leading role in the financing of the capacity building effort;
- In their preliminary remarks, each delegation confirmed the commitment of his or her country to the success of the Committee. In this regard, the Committee recommended that ACBF expands its network of partners beyond the traditional donors and urged African countries to demonstrate more political will and more consistency and coherence in their financial contribution to the Foundation, while encouraging ACBF to explore innovative financing modalities including carbon financing;
- The Committee also recognized that due to the increased competition for scarce financial resources, there is need for professionalization of resource mobilization. Nevertheless, the Committee expressed awareness that the future of the Foundation depends on its success and recommended that African countries should ensure their contributions to pan-African institutions, especially ACBF, reflect their growth;
- The presentation made by the ACBF Secretariat thereafter revealed that ACBF’s financing has been externally driven since the inception of the Foundation. The cumulative share of African member countries has not exceeded 5% of the Foundation’s resources to date. The presentation also indicated the increasing donor fatigue of non-African partners and underscored the urgent need for Africans to take the driver’s seat in the financing of ACBF;
- The Secretariat’s presentation also underlined the critical importance of political support by African countries in ACBF’s resource mobilization efforts in general and in particular in the continuation and consolidation of cooperation with multilateral and non-African partners. The presentation finally suggested the following capacity building avenues to revitalize the Foundation’s resource mobilization effort: Infrastructure project preparation and management; Management of complex contracts; Private sector development; Domestic resource mobilization; an Environment-Friendly Industrialization; Africa’s engagement with the rest of the World;
- Delegates welcomed the proposed avenues, proposed that capacity for good economic and financial management be added as a focus area and urged coordination and cooperation with other pan-African organizations already working in the same areas, starting with the African Union. The Committee also reiterated its recommendation that ACBF should look for new partnerships in middle income African countries, the BRICS and the Middle East, as well as in institutions like the ECOWAS Investment and Development Bank and the West African Development Bank. It also recommended that the Foundation should explore new ways of operating that are likely to help renew the cooperation with traditional partners and attract new ones;
- The Committee noted with satisfaction the institutional strengthening that has taken place at ACBF which makes resource mobilization a joint effort of all the governance organs of the Foundation (Board of Governors, Executive Board and Secretariat). It acknowledged the good diagnosis made by the Secretariat on the Foundation’s resource mobilization, which should lead to designing adequate solutions. The Committee also welcomed the proposed thematic approach mentioned in paragraph to resource mobilization but warned against the Foundation spreading itself too widely;
- The Committee agreed to engage African Heads of State in addressing the financing challenges for capacity building and decided to solicit one of them to champion this cause with his peers and the international community. The Committee suggested in this regard that a note be prepared to the high attention of His Excellency Faure Gnassingbé, President of the Togolese Republic to solicit his leadership;
- The Committee recommended a stronger communication of ACBF’s results to date to allow Heads of State and potential donors to better understand the Foundation’s importance. It also requested the Secretariat to communicate better on the internal effort made to restructure and revitalize the Foundation, which led to a drastic reduction of its operating costs;
- The Committee encouraged ACBF to explore capacity building for peace and security in order to contribute to stability which is critical to development in African countries. In the same vein, the Committee suggested that ACBF explores the potential of sovereign wealth funds and the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI);
- Finally, the Committee recommended that ACBF introduces a paradigm shift to avoid being seen as a donor-driven institution. Such move would open the Foundation up to cooperation with new partners like the BRICS. The Committee suggested that think tanks and policy units supported by the Foundation could help reflect on this change process;
- Following the review of the Terms of Reference, the Committee recommended that:
- The Terms of Reference are made explicit on the long-term objective of the Committee and that its goal is to grow the Endowment Fund;
- Task allocation is clarified between the Committee and the Executive Board;
- Details are provided on the breakdown of the Foundation’s institutional costs which are expected to be covered in the low case scenario of the Endowment Fund;
- The Secretariat speeds up the process of preparing a resource mobilization strategy to guide the operations of the Committee;
- Each Governor appoints a high ranking official who will act as focal point for the activities of the Committee;
- The members of the Committee make every effort to pay their contributions in order to be in a position to request the same from other member countries;
- The financing of the Committee’s operations is made through voluntary contributions of member countries but in the interim, these operations would be financed under the ACBF budget until voluntary contributions are received or new resources are received as a result of success in the Committee’s activities;
- These comments were taken into account in the final version of the terms of reference approved by the Committee;
- Finally, covering the last point of its agenda, the Committee developed a Work Plan in 12 points including :
- Engaging vigorously countries that have not honored their pledges and those that are in arrears to pay their contributions to allow the Foundation to meet its commitments to the World Bank (50% by end 2014; 65% by end of 2015 and 75% by end of 2016);
- Engage World Bank and the African Development Bank to honor their pledges in full;
- Engage Bilateral Partners in an attempt to bring them back;
- Explore new partners, including the private sector;
- Hold consultations with South Africa on engagement with other BRICS members and on the role of the BRICS Bank and its regional office to be hosted by South Africa;
- Hold consultations with the African Union Commission;
- Prepare an Operations Manual for the Committee;
- Adopt a resource mobilization strategy;
- Prepare a Technical Note on innovative financing (carbon financing);
- Hold meeting with the Executive Board;
- Improve Communication to better tell ACBF’s success story;
- Engage with African countries including those that are not contributors to the ACBF;
- The Committee decided to give immediate priority to the first two activities of the Work Plan and deferred the other points to next year (2015);
- In closing its deliberations, the Committee expressed appreciation to its Chair, Pr. Kako NUBUKPO, for his exemplary leadership of the meeting. The delegates also expressed gratitude to His Excellency the President of the Togolese Republic, the Government and the people of Togo for the warm welcome extended to each of them since their arrival;
- The date and venue of the next meeting of the Committee will be selected by the Chair of the Committee in consultation with the ACBF Executive Secretary;
- Signed in Lomé on 5 November 2014
