ECOWAS DONORS' MEETING HIGHTLIGHTS PROGRESS

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 ABUJA 003130 SIPDIS SENSITIVE SIPDIS DEPARTMENT FOR AF/W AND AF/RSA DEPARMENT PASS TO USTR (AGAMA) TREASURY FOR DAN PETERS USDOC FOR 3317/ITA/OA/KBURRESS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ECIN ETRD EINV EAID PREL NI ECOWAS SUBJECT: ECOWAS DONORS' MEETING HIGHTLIGHTS PROGRESS REF: 2005 ABUJA 2496 ¶1. (U) Summary: Development partners of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) met November 20-21 in Abuja for a progress report on the organization's initiatives. While peace and security issues remain central to ECOWAS's work, transforming the ECOWAS Secretariat into a Commission, building institutional capacity, expanding participation in the ECOWAS Donors Pool Fund and deepening regional integration were areas the ECOWAS Secretariat identified as priorities during this year's donors' meeting. Overall, the donors seemed pleased with ECOWAS's progress to date, but as the ECOWAS Secretariat leadership acknowledged, more remains to be done. The USG continues to play an important role in facilitating the organization's progress; more can be done with committed and long-term support for its reform and economic integration agenda. End Summary. -------------- Donors' Meeting Highlights -------------- ¶2. (U) Transformation of the ECOWAS Secretariat into a Commission was center stage at this year's annual ECOWAS Donors' Coordination Meeting held in Abuja November 20-21. In its January 2006 Heads of State meeting, ECOWAS approved the transformation, creating new positions of president, vice-president and seven commissioners to deepen and accelerate regional integration. Executive Secretary Mohammed Ibn Chambas told donors the commissioner selection process was well underway and candidates had already been identified in a "very competitive process." ¶3. (U) An objective of this transformation is to build ECOWAS's capacity, a central theme at the donors' meeting. This effort, which will be implemented through the Program in Support of ECOWAS Capacity Building (PARECIS),will focus on changing ECOWAS's management culture to include developing a capacity-building strategic framework, and focusing on human resource development and financial management. Chambas appealed to the donor community to join a pool fund established by the French, Canadians and British to strengthen the organization's capacity and consolidate capacity building programs. (Comment: The advantage to the Pool Fund is that it would significantly reduce the ECOWAS' administrative burden as a 
single accountability report on funds is issued, rather than a report for each donor. End Comment.) ¶4. (U) With leadership responsibilities more evenly spread among the new commissioners and enhanced capacity, ECOWAS envisions reenergizing its institutions to accomplish its numerous goals. Principal among these is to deepen regional integration. The organization has a draft roadmap to developing a Regional Strategic Plan that seeks to achieve integration in West Africa by 2015. Elements of achieving this goal include transforming regional and national sectoral structures to create a single regional economic community, an effective common market, a single currency and monetary union, a community governance system, and a common conflict prevention, defense and security system. ¶5. (U) ECOWAS highlighted the West Africa Gas Pipeline project, which is almost complete according to the ECOWAS Secretariat, and the West Africa Power Pool as successful integration projects. ECOWAS noted the need to build the capacity of ECOWAS member state "National Units" as a crucial component of its integration program. ¶6. (U) Peace and security issues were a highlight of the meeting with both General Toure and Colonel Mbaye of the ECOWAS Political Affairs, Defense and Security unit giving presentations that underscored efforts to develop the ECOWAS Stand-by Force (ESF) in accordance with the African Union mandate. General Toure emphasized that ECOWAS was a leader in peace support operations on the continent, but capability gaps remained in the force generation of the ESF. ECOWAS is in the process of conducting assessments in each member country to identify gaps in pledged units. Partner assistance is needed to generate a deployable logistics capability to support the force. Toure noted that ECOWAS needed to build its peace support operations doctrinal base to more clearly define force tactics, techniques and procedures, training and evaluation, and standard operating procedures. -------------- Donor Feedback -------------- ¶7. (U) Canada and the EU gave the donor keynote addresses during the conference. Other donors represented included China, Denmark, ABUJA 00003130 002 OF 002 Portugal, The Netherlands, Finland, Norway, the UK, France, Japan, Spain, Hungary, Sweden and the U.S. In a postmortem of the conference, donors met on November 22 to share their impressions of ECOWAS's progress to date and to chart the way forward on ECOWAS engagement. Overall, donors held positive, yet realistic, views about ECOWAS's capacity building efforts and peace and security program. Some cautioned that given the organization's upcoming structural transformation, it might need additional support as new commissioners and directors come on board. Donors called for harmonization of capacity building programs to avoid overwhelming ECOWAS with too many projects. The Canadians pointed out the need for advocacy from donors on regional integration within those countries where they have a diplomatic presence, with the French emphasizing that integration ultimately would have to be implemented by member states. ¶8. (U) The EU representative pointed out that China and India are playing a greater role in Africa and that the Chinese have greatly increased spending on infrastructure and investment in ECOWAS. The UK Liaison Officer to ECOWAS said there is a level of satisfaction among the donors on the Standby Force. The Spanish underscored the need for the ECOWAS Secretariat to define an implementation strategy and arrange priorities, thus improving efficiency. The Dutch complained that Nigeria's commitment to ECOWAS is opaque and that Nigeria should lead by example. The World Bank reported assisting ECOWAS on a regional poverty reduction strategy. Some donors questioned why West African Economic and Monetary Union (UEMOA) secretariat representatives were not in attendance. (Comment: A SIPDIS major integration challenge not discussed at this donors' meeting but raised in UEMOA's roll out of its own six country Regional Development Plan in Dakar Nov 2-3, 2006, is how ECOWAS will work with UEMOA to integrate activities on sensitive issues such as a common monetary and fiscal regime. End Comment.) -------------- Comment -------------- ¶9. (SBU) ECOWAS's agenda is ambitious for a fragile institution. While it was heartening to hear of its progress on various fronts and its ultimate vision and efforts towards West African integration, the organization has a lot on its plate. Even as donors observed that ECOWAS was spreading itself thin, they were also recommending new action areas such as immigration, gender and environment, making it harder for ECOWAS to set its priorities. Nevertheless, economic integration is clearly identified as a priority, in line with the proposed USG strategy for refocusing engagement with ECOWAS. ¶10. (SBU) The USG can facilitate the organization's progress with committed and long-term support for its reform and economic integration agenda. Helping the ECOWAS leadership remain focused on economic integration and core competencies will be important. However, more important will be engaging member states to set economic integration as national priorities -- the far more difficult task ahead for donors committed to helping ECOWAS fulfill its original mandate. CAMPBELL