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From Africa Recovery, Vol.11#4 (March 1998), page 3 (part of Special Feature on the 2-year review of UNSIA)

The Initiative: an opportunity for Africa

Effectiveness of external support is improving -- K.Y. Amoako

The UN Special Initiative on Africa "is an opportunity not to be squandered," declares Mr. K.Y. Amoako, Executive Secretary of the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and co-chair of the Initiative's steering committee. Among its virtues, he said in an interview with Africa Recovery, the Initiative provides practical and coordinated ways of implementing commitments made to Africa in past international conferences. It is important, Mr. Amoako adds, to put the Initiative in the context of Africa's improved economic performance and enhanced political environment, as seen in increased pluralism in government systems. The Initiative is but one of many ways that the donor community is trying to support these positive developments.

"The emerging consensus is that Africa needs external support to buttress the reform efforts under way," Mr. Amoako says. He notes that this consensus was demonstrated, among other recent international conferences, at the 1997 Denver Summit of the Group of Seven, which recognized Africa's positive developments and pledged to open their markets to African exports and support its efforts to promote democracy and good governance. Similarly, the process of the Japanese-led Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD) aims to support African countries' reforms, deepen international awareness of conditions in Africa, and foster South-South cooperation with Africa. The Development Assistance Committee of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development recently published a paper, "Towards the 21st Century," which gives special attention to focusing development assistance in support of economic, social and political reforms in Africa.

Candidly acknowledging problems evident since the Initiative was launched in 1996, Mr. Amoako also emphasizes areas of progress towards its goals. These include education, from the outset the Initiative's biggest component (see pages 8-13); information technology, where ECA is bringing together African governments, donors and private firms (see pages 22-23); and governance (see pages 14-17). "A younger generation is asserting its commitment to growth and progress," says Mr. Amoako, adding that in the "surge towards political liberalization, the space for the participation of civil society organizations is widening and the role of the media is being encouraged."

Continuing challenges

But there is still much to do to improve perceptions and practices, within Africa as well as in the UN system. Mr. Amoako cites the murmurs in some quarters that the Initiative "was imposed by the UN system on Africa and that there was no real African ownership." Some also argued that it is "but one of the many failed initiatives on Africa," and "a replication of existing initiatives," namely the UN New Agenda for the Development of Africa in the 1990s (UN-NADAF).

With many countries in desperate need of development funds, Mr. Amoako thinks the misunderstanding that the Initiative is a "vehicle to transfer additional development resources" may persist. "Where we have well-developed programmes and strong government ownership at the country-level," he continues, "additionality of resources and synergies under the Special Initiative are evident." This, for instance, has been the case with the education sector in Ethiopia. Similarly, there is real potential for additional resource flows for good governance and information technologies, under the Initiative.

Spearheading coordination

A basic feature of the Initiative is to maximize, through much better coordination, the support the UN system gives to Africa. UN agencies are meant to "spearhead" a "more holistic perception of development efforts in Africa." But a "tendency for business as usual" has made it hard for some agencies to "internalize" Initiative goals and work programmes, says Mr. Amoako. "Even where we have committed agencies," he adds, collaboration has not been easy in some sectors, leading to slow progress on practical steps at the country level.

On the question of agency collaboration and "turf wars," Mr. Amoako argues that the issue is best resolved through progress in coordination and synergies. "In certain areas, such as governance and education, for instance, we are beginning to see progress," with the coordination in education between the World Bank and UNESCO considered exemplary. In each area of the Initiative, participating agencies have taken up leadership roles, "which were jointly agreed upon" at the outset, to define the scope and modality of assistance.

Mr. Amoako believes the misunderstanding about the relationship between the Initiative and UN-NADAF has been resolved. With coordination "improving all the time," the progress already recorded in some countries has shown that "the UN system as a group can work effectively under the Special Initiative umbrella."

He feels that African ownership will gain momentum as more concrete results are seen. Pointing out that the Initiative is a 10-year programme and not an event, he predicts that evidence of tangible progress "in at least a dozen countries within the coming year" will bring growing support for it.

There may be "a general lack of awareness of what the Special Initiative is really all about," but Mr. Amoako says the remedy is more effective communication. ECA has devised a strategy for outreach and advocacy to improve coordination between communications units of UN agencies and to publicize Initiative activities through various media -- including enhanced outreach to opinion-makers in donor capitals -- to foster "an informed dialogue on Africa's development challenges and achievements." The plans include better dissemination of flagship publications on Africa and development of an authoritative database on Africa housed at ECA's web site (www.un.org/Depts/eca).
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