African Union summit deliberates on key reforms
African heads of state are meeting in Addis Ababa, the capital city of Ethiopia, on November 17 and 18 for their 11th extraordinary African Union (AU) summit.
The meeting's main agenda is to discuss how to reform the AU and make it more relevant to citizens of the continent by increasing its efficiency.
In 2016, heads of state entrusted Rwandan President Paul Kagame with the task of preparing a study on institutional reforms of the AU to put in place a system of governance capable of addressing the challenges facing the Union.
A year later, he presented a report on this, which is now the foundation of discussions at this year's summit.
"Events on our continent and across the world continue to confirm the urgency and necessity of this project," said Kagame at the summit. "The goal is simple, to make Africa stronger and give our people the future they deserve."
President Kagame's report suggests that the AU should reduce its priorities to only four: peace and security, political affairs, economic integration and working towards a strong global presence and voice for Africa.
The prime minister of Ethiopia Abiy Ahmed agreed to the institutional reforms.
"Reaching our destination requires effective, transparent and meritocratic governance of the AU as the driving force," Abiy said.
The AU comprises dozens of entities. For example, there are eight Commission Directorates and 31 departments and offices, alongside eleven AU organs, 31 specialized technical agencies and some twenty high-level committees.
The leaders also agreed to reduce the number of commissions to six from eight with peace and security merged with political affairs. Economic affairs commission will be joined with trade and industry.
Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta advised the AU Commission to ensure that even as it goes on with the new reforms, it should guard against duplication and overlap of responsibilities to improve overall coherence and efficiency in line with best practices.
"In order to take member states and regions on board, we welcome the intention to respect gender parity, and inter and intra-regional rotation, and commend the leadership for the proposal to have a 35 percent threshold of youth in the selection process," President Kenyatta said.
The African leaders have agreed to transform the New Partnership for Development (NEPAD) into the new AU development agency. Since 2001, NEPAD has been the technical arm of the African Union, but was not fully integrated.
President Kagame's report on the reforms says coordination between the Commission and NEPAD remained a challenge with each conducting planning and resource mobilization activities independently, in some cases even competing for the same financial resources. The heads of state will decide the mandate of NEPAD under its new title, AU Development Agency.
Financing of the AU budget is also part of the key areas in the reform agenda deliberation. The AU report shows that in 2017, member states were expected to contribute 26 percent of the proposed $439 million budget while donors are expected to contribute the remaining 74 percent.
The heads of state are working towards achieving 100 percent African funded budget by 2021. From this 75 percent will be for funding AU program budget while 25 percent will go towards peace support operations budget.
The chairperson of the AU commission Mahammat Moussa Faki says commitment should begin by member states honoring their dues to the commission.
"We should and must make progress on sanctions against countries that do not pay up their financial contributions," said Faki. "The objective is to put a definitive end to the chronic delay of payment for their statutory contributions."
The heads of state will also deliberate on recommendations that there be only one AU summit annually instead of the usual two, and the second summit of the year should focus on coordination with regional economic commissions.
Not all leaders agree on all the institutional reforms recommended by President Kagame. Some feel that making the AU stronger may undermine the national sovereignty of the member states.
