Visit of the delegation of the Association of Regions of Cameroon to the headquarters of UCLG Africa

On Friday 25 November 2022, a delegation of the Association of Regions of Cameroon paid an exchange visit to the headquarters of UCLG Africa in Rabat. “In UCLG Africa, the Association of Regions of Cameroon is at home; it needs all of the experience from the organization to help in its construction”. It’s with these opening words that the head of the delegation of the Association of Regions of Cameroon, Mr. Oumarou Ousmanou, President of the Regional Council of Northern Cameroon, thanked UCLG Africa for its welcome.

The objective of this visit was to explore ways and means of collaboration between the Association of Regions of Cameroon and UCLG Africa. This visit of the delegation was also an opportunity for them to learn about the mechanisms put in place in the regions of Tangier and Fez on topics such as local taxation, the repository of jobs within the regions, training, governance and decentralized cooperation.

Member of FORAF (Forum of African Regions), the association of regions of Cameroon intends to fully play its role in this network launched by UCLG Africa in September 2022, and participate fully in achieving its objectives.

The meeting began with a word of welcome from the Deputy Secretary General of UCLG Africa, Mr. Morris Mbolela, who at the beginning of his speech, thanked the nascent Association of Regions of Cameroon for its commitment to work alongside its peers for the development of territories, and within UCLG Africa as a full member. This welcome was followed by a round table discussion of the members of the delegation who expressed in turn their expectations and pointed out that the services offered by UCLG Africa to its members are of high quality and will certainly help the Association to build itself.

A presentation of UCLG Africa was made to the delegation by the person responsible for knowledge management. It focused on the program of governance, advocacy & decentralized development for Africa (GADEPPA 2.0) in its version 2.0 which covers the period 2021-2030. This program is an invitation to the association to collaborate on all the priority themes selected and around the programs and projects implemented by UCLG Africa and its members.

During the exchange visit, suggestions were made and taken into consideration by the delegation: Strengthen the collaboration between the “National School of Local Administration (NASLA)” of Cameroon and the African Local Government Academy (ALGA) of UCLG Africa, explore the possibility for the association to institutionalize the development of voluntary sub-national reports on the localization of the SDGs (VSR) in collaboration with the Association of Communes and United Cities of Cameroon (CVUC)  and, capitalize on the process of establishing the association of regions of Cameroon to inform and accompany peers that would be part of the same approach.

This meeting ended with a word of gratitude from the head of the delegation, the handing over of a gift and finally a family photo of all the participants, with the promise to meet again very soon and develop a shared work plan.

The delegation consisted of:

1.           Mr. FRU ANGWAFOR III: VP/ARC (Association of Regions of Cameroon);

2.           M. OUAMAROU OUSMANOU: SG/ARC;

3.           Mr. PEZZINI RONC: Project Assistant;

4.           Mr. ADEL EL MOUDIR: Expert in Decentralization

5.           Mr. NGAMBI DIKOUME Robert; ARC Executive Secretary;

6.           Mrs. ELLA MEYE Lydie Epse ESSISSIMA: Head of the Studies, Statistics, Planning and Cooperation Division – MINDDEVEL.