1

Report on Progress of work on the Governance Cluster

Regional Coordination Mechanism (10th RCM)

5 – 6 November 2009

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

By

Zemenay Lakew, Regional Service Center, JNB

2

Report cont’d

The cluster has continued to function in two main sub-themes:

(A) Political Governance (UNDP)

(B) Economic and Corporate Governance (ECA)

3

A) Political Governance:

1. Support to NEPAD: UNDP working with ECA and AfDB has been

providing advisory services at the highest level through:• participation in the NEPAD Steering Committee

meetings, HSGIC and the Africa Partnership Forum.

4

Support to APRM: Financial and institutional support: UNDP has continued to manage and

implement the APRM Trust Fund with a budget of about US$13 million of which UNDP contributes US$2.75 million

UNDP, ECA and the AfDB have provided technical and Advisory Services to APR Panel and Secretariat

Uganda, Nigeria , Burkina Faso, Mali, Mozambique, Lesotho, and Mauritius have been reviewed.

Linking and harmonizing APRM National Programme of Actions with National Development plans.

Follow up missions and support mission to Zambia and Ethiopia.

5

Report cont’d ECA organized an African think tanks Expert Group

Meeting focusing on “Strategic Research Direction in Support of the APRM implementation” in Feb. 2009;

Capacity building of APRM stakeholders and APRM Senstization and training workshops in support of country process. These were organized in Dar es Salaam, Djibouti, Cameroon, Togo, Guinea. Additional training workshops were also held in Burundi, Mali, and Cote D’Ivoire.

6

Report cont’d

3. Africa Governance Report (AGR): UNDP and ECA are closely working on this flagship report. The UNDP country offices have supported the conduct of this study in a number of countries

B) Economic Governance ECA has continued to provide advisory services in this

area through its support to the African Peer Review Mechanism

7

Report cont’d The cluster has been reinvigorated and in its meeting of 8th

September co-chaired by AU and UNDP in which several agencies participated it reconsidered a number of issues including: relevance of the cluster; configuration of the cluster and the development of joint actions. Agreement was reached and relevance of the cluster was reaffirmed. UNDP was also requested to continue its leadership role as the Coordinator of the Governance cluster with the AU, NEPAD and APRM Secretariat serving as co-chairs.

8

Report cont’d In order to further enhance the collaboration and

expand future joint actions that respond to the continent’s priorities in the area of governance as defined by the AUC, it was recommended that the AU Department of Political Affairs (DPA) Governance Program work plan for the coming years be shared to members of the cluster to serve as an anchor for UN support in addition to the AU 2009-2012 Strategic plan.

9

It was agreed to maintain the current scope of the cluster to Political and Economic Governance however there was recognition that there was an overlap in coverage with other clusters in particular Peace and Security with the human rights and post conflict recovery areas therefore there should be active inter-cluster collaboration. A new TOR for the cluster should be developed.

10

Next steps UNDP| should organize another meeting to provide the opportunity

for the AU to share its strategic plan and engage with UN agencies. Accordingly the Pre-RCM cluster meeting was held on 4th

November. The AU presented the DPA’s strategic plan and work plan for the 2009 – 2012, NEPAD Secretariat also presented its plan for the coming year. Similarly the UN agencies that attended the meeting also highlighted some of the key governance initiatives. The meeting agreed that the UNDP will follow up on these deliberations, further engage with the AU and the agencies, develop the new Terms of Reference for the cluster, identify areas of convergence and also develop a business plan for consideration at the next cluster meeting to be held in the first quarter of 2010.