Abuja — The President of the ECOWAS Commission, His Excellency James Victor Gbeho, has called for vigilance and prudence to shield the region from the adverse effects of the finance crisis rocking some developed countries. Opening the four-day 10th ECOWAS Meeting of the Administration and Finance Committee (AFC) at the Commission on Wednesday 23rd November 2011, he noted that economic conditions within developed countries impact on the economies of developing countries. While the economies of ECOWAS Member States have managed to remain stable despite the difficult times, the President insists that budgetary restraints are still needed. In spite of the thawing of the global recession, the President said the Commission has imposed the prudent principle of a reducing its budget for 2012 by six per cent over the 2011 figures within each department while conscious that the regional institutions have to remain operational which explains the addition of some new programmes for the consideration of the committee.

The President explained that the Commission and the Community as a whole, continues to enjoy the support of its international partners, who have not ceased to believe in the region's ability and the potentials of its Institutions to contribute to improving the level of development of the entire West Africa region and its contribution to the global economy. Based on this positive appraisal and in order to sustain the level of support, he said that development partners will look to our programmes and how well they are managed to provide them with the "vital proof of our commitment to providing leadership and guidance in regional economic development." The regular annual budget session of the AFC, the most crucial of the statutory meetings of the Community, reviews the budgets and endorses the programmes of all the Community Institutions and Agencies, including the ECOWAS Commission, the Community Parliament, and the Court of Justice. These are then recommended to the Council of Ministers for approval. The meeting also considers and refers to the Council of Ministers for adoption, policy issues submitted to it by the Commission and the other Institutions and Agencies of the Community. In addition to budgetary and policy issues, the President said this session of the AFC will also consider four reports and seven memoranda. Of critical importance, he said, are the memoranda on the Implementation Status of the Protocol on the Community Levy, the Establishment of the ECOWAS Solidarity Fund, the ECOWAS Staff Pension Scheme, the ECOWAS Humanitarian Response Mechanism and the Operational Manual for ECOWAS National Units. Another area of focus in the activities of the Commission for 2012 is the implementation of directives given to the Commission by the ECOWAS Convergence Council. At its 60th Ordinary Session held in Lomé, Togo, on 14th October 2011, the Council consisting of Ministers of Finance and Governors of Central Banks of Member States noted the need for strengthening the Multilateral Surveillance Mechanism in the Region and directed the ECOWAS Commission to take leadership of the Mechanism and strengthen cooperation among the Regional Institutions involved in its implementation.

A Memorandum on the financial implications of this new directive will be considered by the current AFC session. According to the President, the transformation of the Executive Secretariat into a Commission coupled with the ECOWAS Vision 2020 for a citizen-centred organization undeniably necessitates a new communication policy that strategically responds to the demands of the environment and which constitutes a more effective tool for citizen sensitization and mobilization deploying all the modern ICT platforms. This, he said, is because the imperative of citizen participation is critical to the success of the regional integration project, and in view of the fact that the previous policy of 2000 had become inadequate in responding to the dynamics of the regional and international environment. The new Communication policy and the accompanying norms and standards document were endorsed by the sectoral ministers who met in Abuja in January to review them. In her opening remarks, the Chair of the AFC and Head of the ECOWAS National Unit, Nigeria, Dr. Uche Ajulu-Okeke, apologized that the meeting was being held one month behind schedule due to exigencies in the Commission's agenda this year. But she emphasized that this took nothing away from the importance of the AFC session, as a critical statutory meeting that underscores the baseline of all the programmes and activities of the community institutions and agencies. Dr. Okeke, a director in Nigeria's Foreign Affairs Ministry welcomed delegates to the meeting and solicited their patience and quality contributions towards enriching the outcome of the session.