Third Edition of the African Forum of Territorial Managers and Training Institutes Targeting Local Governments (FAMI): IFRANE’S CALL TO ACTION
IFRANE’S CALL TO ACTION FOR THE MOBILIZATION AND IMPLEMENTATION OF INNOVATIVE AND SUSTAINABLE FINANCING FOR TRAINING AND CAPACITY BUILDING OF LOCAL ELECTED OFFICIALS
AND HUMAN RESOURCES OF AFRICAN LOCAL GOVERNMENTS
We, Representatives of Local Governments and Training Institutes involved in the process of Decentralization, Local Governance and Local Development, meeting from 10 to 14 in Ifrane, Morocco, on the occasion of the 3rd Edition of the African Forum of Territorial Managers and Training Institutes Targeting Local Governments
(FAMI), organized by the African Local Governments Academy(ALGA) of the United Cities and Local Governments of Africa (UCLG Africa), on the theme: “Financing learning, training and capacity building for local elected officials and local human resources in Africa: for innovative and sustainable mechanisms”;
– Launch a Solemn Appeal to the decision-makers at local, national, panAfrican and international levels to make the issue of the Human Capital of Local Governments, Authorities and Administrations one of the main priorities in
the implementation of Decentralization policies, the domestication and localization of the African Union Agenda 2063, as well as the Global Agendas, adopted by the United Nations, in particular Agenda 2030 of the Sustainable
Development Goals, the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, and the New Urban Agenda.
– It should be recalled that weak capacities are a serious obstacle to the achievement and success of Decentralization, to the achievement of sustainable development and to the anchoring of Good Governance at the territorial level.
ʹ
– Call on decision-makers to comply with the guidelines and directives adopted at the pan-African and international levels to rethink their action regarding the priority given to the development of Human Capital within local and regional governments and authorities.
– The African Union’s Vision 2063 “The Africa we want”, in paragraph 14, emphasizes the following: “Africa’s Human Capital will be fully developed as the most precious resource, including through sustained investments based on universality in early childhood and basic education, and also through sustained investments in higher education, science, technology, research and innovation, and the elimination of inequalities between men and women at all levels of education.
Access to higher education will be expanded and strengthened by providing modern world-class learning and research infrastructures to support the scientific reforms that underpin the continent’s transformation”.
– The Resolution adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 20 December 2017, No. 72/235 on Human Resources Development, commits the international community to place human resources development at the heart of sustainable development in its three dimensions, economic, social and environmental; and on the other hand, to develop short-, medium- and long-term strategies to effectively improve capacity in this area, as sustained, shared and equitable economic growth and development are not possible without an educated, skilled, healthy, competent, productive and adaptable workforce”.
On this basis, we recommend the following in the context of strengthening the Human Capital of local and regional authorities in Africa:
1. Define an appropriate legal framework that establishes the right to lifelong learning for local elected officials and human resources of local and regional governments and authorities in Africa.
2. Promote employment within Africa’s Territorial Administrations as one of the first options in the career choice of young people entering the labour market by putting in place adequate incentive frameworks and community human resource planning methods adapted to the contexts of the different communities.
͵
3. Implement innovative and sustainable mechanisms for financing training, capacity building, and empowering for local and regional governments and authorities in Africa, in particular by establishing a levy of 1 to 5 per cent of the wage bill paid to local and regional authority staff, to be devoted to training, capacity building and empowering local elected officials, managers and other staff of these territorial and local institutions, taking into account national contexts and the diversity of the financing mechanisms and models involved.
4. Establish at national level, an autonomous institution responsible for the organization and management of training and capacity building for local and regional governments and authorities in Africa, the management of which should be as joint as possible, integrating into its management the national administrations responsible for the civil service and employment, local and regional authorities and decentralization, as well as the National Association of Local and Regional Authorities and the representatives of local and regional authorities’ executives and staff. This autonomous institution would collect and manage the amount of the levy on the payroll of local authorities to ensure training and capacity building for local governments and authorities.
5. Establish a National Observatory of Human Resources of Local Governments and Authorities with the participation of training institutes and academia to encourage Public Authorities to adopt human resources management standards, and a culture of comparative performance in the management of territorial administrations in Africa. Information from the various national observatories should be able to feed into the African Observatory on Human Resources of Local Authorities developed at the level of the African Local Governments Academy(ALGA) of the United Cities and Local Governments of Africa (UCLG Africa).
Let us commit ourselves to promoting this call to Action for Human Capital of Africa’s Local and Regional Governments and Authorities, and the implementation of its recommendations.
Done at Ifrane, on Thursday 13 June 2019
The Participants in the 3rd African Forum of Territorial Managers and Training
Institutes targeting the Local Government
Read the final report of the forum here.
Motion of thanks addressed to His Majesty King Mohammed VI of Morocco.
