Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
06NIAMEY1075
2006-09-22 16:22:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Niamey
Cable title:  

POLITICAL DECENTRALIZATION IN NIGER: (STILL) A

Tags:  PGOV KDEM KCOR EAID NG 
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VZCZCXRO7485
RR RUEHPA
DE RUEHNM #1075/01 2651622
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
R 221622Z SEP 06
FM AMEMBASSY NIAMEY
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 2927
INFO RUEHZK/ECOWAS COLLECTIVE
RUEHAR/AMEMBASSY ACCRA 0387
RUFGCIN/CDR USEUCOM VAIHINGEN GE
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 NIAMEY 001075 

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT: FOR AF/W, BACHMAN; ACCRA FOR AID/WA, SCHULMAN; DEPT:
PLEASE PASS TO USAID FOR AMARTIN

E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/22/2016
TAGS: PGOV KDEM KCOR EAID NG
SUBJECT: POLITICAL DECENTRALIZATION IN NIGER: (STILL) A
LONG ROAD AHEAD

REF: 05 NIAMEY 865

Classified By: POLITICAL OFFICER ZACH HARKENRIDER FOR REASON 1.4 (D)

-------
SUMMARY
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C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 NIAMEY 001075

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT: FOR AF/W, BACHMAN; ACCRA FOR AID/WA, SCHULMAN; DEPT:
PLEASE PASS TO USAID FOR AMARTIN

E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/22/2016
TAGS: PGOV KDEM KCOR EAID NG
SUBJECT: POLITICAL DECENTRALIZATION IN NIGER: (STILL) A
LONG ROAD AHEAD

REF: 05 NIAMEY 865

Classified By: POLITICAL OFFICER ZACH HARKENRIDER FOR REASON 1.4 (D)

--------------
SUMMARY
--------------


1. (C) More than two years have passed since Nigeriens
elected local councils to govern the country's 265 communes.
The advent of political decentralization - a subject of
discussion for most of the nation's first four decades of
independence - was greeted with excitement by ordinary
Nigeriens who felt that locally elected governments would
help them to reach their development goals in areas such as
education, health, and hydrology more effectively and
democratically than had the old system of rule by centrally
appointed civil servants and traditional chiefs (reftel).
Since the elections, international donors, including the USG,
have matched their support for the concept of local democracy
with resource commitments aimed at local communities'
training
and development needs. However, two years away from the next
set of commune elections, (scheduled for the summer of 2008)
a
donor-funded stock-taking has revealed just how far Niger
still
is from realizing the promise of this important
democratization
initiative. Moreover, the report suggests that the largest
problem facing the country's local democratic governments is
the Government of Niger's (GON) tepid enthusiasm for a
process
to which it was never sufficiently committed. END SUMMARY.

-------------- --------------
THE EU'S "COMPTE RENDU" - NOT ENOUGH MONEY,
COORDINATION, OR ATTENTION
-------------- --------------


2. (U) On September 20, the European Union released a
"provisional
report on the transfer of authority to commune governments."
This
scathing review offered few positive points, and stressed the
gap
between rhetorical and legal commitments to decentralization
with
practice on the ground. Commune governments, it argued, still
lacked meaningful sources of revenue; sufficient staff and
training; equipment and infrastructure; and, the authority to

fulfill the responsibilities the law bestowed upon them. Much
of
the problem derives from the fact that many decentralization
laws
(passed in stages, mostly between 1998 and 2003) require
administrative decrees to clarify and enable implementation.
Due
to bureaucratic confusion, the executive branch of the GON
has yet
to draft many of these decrees; others are still pending
before the
Council of Ministers.


3. (U) The case of infrastructure and equipment transfer from
the
central administration to the communes is illustrative. A
decree
envisioned by the law has been drafted, but not forwarded to
the
Council of Ministers. Moreover, an inventory of the goods to
be
transferred, their quantities and condition, has yet to be
conducted. Revenue streams are similarly problematic.
Communes
are supposed to derive funds from central government revenue
sharing and their own local fees, fines, and taxes on things
like
markets, licenses, property, and construction. However, the
communes
have yet to truly benefit from either source of revenue.
While the
laws authorizing revenue sharing have been passed, the
decrees
detailing its functioning have not been developed. The EU
study
stated that no one in the process knew when or if those

NIAMEY 00001075 002 OF 004


decrees
would be promulgated.


4. (U) Decentralization law lists eleven separate taxes that
are
supposed to accrue to the communes. Absent sufficient
training and
staff (in particular tax collectors and recorders),communes
are
still relying on the GON to collect most taxes for them - and
the
GON is keeping 70-80% or more of the revenues. Only in cases
where
the communes themselves are in a position to collect taxes
directly
(and examples are limited to the head tax and local license
fees)
do they receive most of the revenue.


5. (U) The EU report listed more general concerns as well:
Decentralization laws are not clear, and are rife with
lacunae; all
communes need more training on everything, but not all have
international partners to assist them. NOTE: Approximately 70
of
Niger's 265 communes have received no donor support, while
all
others have received either steady or episodic assistance.
END
NOTE Other problems abound. Some urban communes are expected
to fund
certain costs of the central government's Governors and
Prefects based
within their jurisdictions, even though these officials are
not, in
point of law, their responsibility. At the same time, the GON
- which
is supposed to fund the salaries of civil servants assigned
to the
communes while local governments pick up certain other
expenses -
is not maintaining its side of the financial bargain.
Finally, the
report noted that too many actors in the process still view
the
communes as an inconvenience or simply as implementers of
decisions
made at a higher level, rather than as real representative
actors in
their own right. The Governors, Prefects, Sub-Prefects,
relevant
Ministries, and traditional chiefs have yet to fully
understand their
relationships to the commune governments and vice versa, even
though
this is one of the points that most donor supported trainings
have
attempted to elucidate.


6. (C) COMMENT: In general, the EU report painted a picture
of
confusion and a near total lack of coordination within the
GON.
Communes are empowered on paper, but lack the resources
necessary to
take charge of their responsibilities. The EU report
concluded with
an "urgent plan" to revive the process. The transfer of
meaningful
resources, the revision of texts, and the promulgation of
necessary
decrees were all recommended as short term solutions, and
these do
suggest a practical way forward. If donors give the GON a
solid push,
it could accomplish all of these items within the reasonable
six-month
timeline outlined by the EU team. However, while the EU
report's
depressing conclusions merited hearing, the GON did a poor
job of
listening. END COMMENT

-------------- --------------
GON REACTION ILLUMINATES CAUSES OF BUREAUCRATIC CONFUSION
-------------- --------------


NIAMEY 00001075 003 OF 004



7. (C) During the EU presentation, the dais was occupied by
the
highest-level GON official in the room - the Acting High
Commissioner
for the Modernization of the State (HCMS). "Acting" for over
a year,
the HCMS is head of a small office with limited resources.
Its most
qualified personnel were transferred to other administrative
functions
in the summer of 2005, and its name changed from High
Commission for
Decentralization and Modernization of the State. At the same
time,
other GON organs began to lay claim to its functions. The
Ministry
of the Interior and Decentralization and the newly created
High
Council for Territorial Collectivities are both charged with
administering the decentralization process, while a special
counselor
in the Prime Minister's Office has a planning and
conceptualiziation
role. Though their duties are somewhat distinct, they
collectively lay
claim to all of the former bureaucratic territory of the
HCMS.
Officials of both organizations have spoken dismissively of
the HCMS,
and stressed their own leadership roles in the process in
meetings
with Emboffs. This confusion and the HCMS's weakened role
suggest that
the GON is both unclear as to where lines of authority on
decentralization are drawn, and unwilling to consistently
commit
high-level attention to the issue.

-------------- --------------
COMMENT: WHY DECENTRALIZATION STILL MERITS DONOR SUPPORT
-------------- --------------


8. (C) Very little of the foregoing was new to Poloff. The
fact that
we have heard all of this before speaks to the intractability
of
these problems in the Nigerien context, but also to the GON's
half-hearted implementation of a regieme whose strongest
supporters
have always been "outsiders," - international donors seeking
greater
accountability, participation, and transparency; Tuareg and
Toubou
rebels and other ethnic minorities seeking greater political
control
over their regions; good governance advocates; and, ordinary
Nigeriens at the village level. Traditional elites ranging
from the
chieftaincy to the secular administrative authorities have
never been
fully "sold" on the process. Absent a genuine commitment on
the part
of the GON to making local governments work for their people,
Niger
may take many more years to pass its latest democratization
test. It
is important, however, that it do so. In spite of the dismal
progress
made so far, decentralization merits our continued support.
Post
believes that supporting this process should be central to
any
country assistance strategy. Post believes that the commune -
exempt
from Nethercutt Amendment restrictions on assistance and more
reliable
than the central government in matter of probity and
transparency -
should become our key development focal point and partner.


9. (C) Functional local governments where citizens -
particularly
minorities with histories of alienation from the state like
the Tuaregs
and Toubous - have a say in how their communities are taxed,
policed,
developed, and governed are still viewed as more legitimate

NIAMEY 00001075 004 OF 004


and
desireable by ordinary Nigeriens than the old system of
top-down
administration. If the GON's writ is to extend into the
fragile
post-conflict zones of the north and east, it will be via
participatory
institutions like commune governments and rural radio
networks, that
bring people and their government closer together. Moreover,
given the
sense of ownership that attaches to local resources when they
are
managed by local people, decentralization helps to minimize
corruption.
The donor community got this much right when it backed
decentralization
at the start of this decade. The EU study did not focus on
donors'
roles. However, reading between the lines suggests that
Niger's
international partners must do a better job of coordinating
their
actions, encouraging the GON to move the process forward, and
providing
resources that directly meet the challanges faced by the
communes with
regard to revenue and capacity.


10. (C) The USG's latest effort, via Trans Sahara Counter
Terrorism
Partnership (TSCTP) development funds, suggests the means by
which
this should be done. While European donors have shifted their
focus
toward central government capacity building since 2004-5 -
and may
thereby succeed in sorting out some of the incoherence that
exists
at that level - our $1.1 million, two-year effort builds on
our
existing commitment to commune level intervention. It is
designed
to give commune governments a shot in the arm via training
and
microcredit loans that will catalysze revenue generating
economic
activities at the local level. With implementing partner
Mercy Corps,
we are focusing on some of the communes that need the most
help -
rural, nomadic communities in the ex-rebel belt of the Air
and
Aizawak. Getting local democracy right in these regions is
about
more than ensuring good governance in Niger, it is about
stabilizing
the country's most sensitive border zones. The stakes in that
game
are high enough to justify the sort of patient, long-term
commitment
to trial and error that can alone yield success in the face
of the
obstacles cited by the EU's report. END COMMENT
ALLEN