Ethiopia: International Consultancy Service to evaluate the operationalisation of the African Governance Architecture and the development of the AGA roadmap.

Organization: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH
Country: Ethiopia
Closing date: 14 Jun 2018

Terms of References

For

CONSULTANCY SERVICE TO

EVALUATE THE OPERATIONALISATION OF THE AFRICAN GOVERNANCE ARCHITECTURE AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE AGA ROADMAP 2018-2020

Reference No.: 83290584

BACKGROUND

In 2011, the 16th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of Heads of States and Government adopted the decision to put in place a “Pan-African Architecture on Governance”. In order to give effect to this Assembly decision, the African Union Commission (AUC) established the African Governance Architecture (AGA) and launched the AGA Platform in 2012 as a “platform for dialogue between the various stakeholders” who are mandated to promote good governance and strengthen democracy in Africa, in addition to translating the objectives of the legal and policy pronouncements in the AU Shared Values.

The AGA was established to address a number of challenges which the continent was grappling with at the time. First, is the inadequate internalization; ratification, domestication, implementation and reporting on progress, of the African Shared values norms and standards. The second is the limited coordination, collaboration and cooperation amongst the various organs and institutions created to drive the internalization at the continental and regional levels. The Policy Organs conceded that despite the plethora of policies and structures established, the continent still grapples with governance deficits occasioned by several challenges, including the slow uptake of democratic governance norms and standards by Member States in terms ratification, domestication and implementation. In addition, in some areas, the continent continues to witness a regression in democratic practices, characterized by constitutional manipulations to prolong tenure by incumbents, shrinking political and civic spaces, low participation of citizens, refusal to accept election results, violations of human and peoples’ rights, including arbitrary arrests and detentions, limited access to media platforms, intentional internet access blockade and restrictions, amongst others.

The AGA was therefore established to provide a more coherent front in addressing the challenges faced in enhancing democratic governance in Africa with emphasis on structural prevention of the triggers of conflict on the continent. The added value of the AGA therefore lies in how it enhances the delivery capacity of AU Organs, institutions as well as RECs, in translating AU Shared values commitments to democracy and governance to concrete actions that supports, complements and enhances AU Member States capacity to consolidate and improve democratic governance in Africa.

To achieve this, AGA is structured along four inter-dependent pillars; Norms and Standards, Institutional Mechanism, Interaction Mechanism and the African Governance Fund.

Evaluation of the Operationalisation of the AGA and the development of 2018 – 2020 AGA Roadmap

Since its establishment, modest gains have been recorded in the operationalization of the AGA. Various policy and institutional structures have been put in place to ensure the effectiveness and efficiency in the delivery of its goals and objectives. In January 2016, the AU Assembly of Heads of State and Government, adopted the AGA Framework Document and its Rules of procedure of its Platform. These were direct results of its 2014 – 2017 Strategic Plan which prioritized the institutional development of the various AGA Structures and mechanisms.

Following the establishment of the Platform in 2012, emphasis was placed on incremental involvement of the 19 constituting organs, institutions and the Regional Economic Communities (RECs) in the activities of the Platform. Since 2013, regular Technical and Political meetings of the AGA have been held with significant participation of its members. The Political Meeting; the highest decision-making structure of the AGA have been convened twice in December 2015 and 2017 respectively. This has led to the election of two consecutive Bureaus of the AGA. Currently, the Political Bureau is chaired by African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) as the Vice Chair and the Department of Political Affairs, on behalf of the African Union Commission is the Rapporteur.

In addition, two of the five clusters of the AGA Platform have been launched as coordinating units for the various thematic focus areas of the AGA. Furthermore, giant strides have taken in developing various strategies to guide the work of the AGA particularly in the areas of citizen engagement including youths and women, knowledge management and strengthening communication of AGA goals and objectives. The AGA Platform has witnessed increased vertical and horizontal cooperation amongst its Platform members with increased appetite for joint programme planning, implementation and monitoring of progress.

Despite this relative success in the five years of the AGA Platform, the potential impact of the AGA is yet to be fully realized. For instance, the clusters as the organizing unit for coordinated interventions in the various thematic focus areas of the AGA are yet to be fully operational. The promise of increased synergy with other Architectures such as the African Peace and Security Architecture have also not been fully realized. While there has been increased buy-in and commitment by the RECs in the AGA process, very few programmatic collaborations have been realized.

Furthermore, since the establishment of the AGA in 2011, several policy pronouncement and institutional reform efforts have been undertaken by the African Union. First, is the adoption of the Agenda 2063 as the development framework for the continent over the next fifty years. Secondly, the AU is undergoing an ambitious institutional reforms aimed at enhancing the delivery capacity of the Union. These have significant impact on the status of the AGA and its potential value addition to the realization of ‘an integrated, prosperous and peaceful Africa, driven by its own citizens and representing a dynamic force in global arena’. The primacy of political affairs, as a key priority area identified by the Kagame Reform report further lays credence to the need for increased role and visibility of the AGA within the structures and programming of the African Union.

This current state of play therefore provides an opportunity to assess the state of play on the operationalization of the AGA thus far, assess its organizational structure and linkages to formal AU policy organs and processes as well as to align its priorities, objectives and programmes to emerging policy changes and directions within the AU particularly, Agenda 2063 and the AU Reforms.

SCOPE OF THE ASSIGNMENT

The scope of the consultancy will cover the evaluation of the AGA process since inception and the development of the AGA 2018 – 2020 Roadmap. The assignment will also cover the validation of inputs from all Platform members through a validation exercise which ensures the buy-in and ownership of the Roadmap by stakeholders.

DESIRED OUTCOMES AND RESPONSIBILITY

By the end of the Consultancy, the consultant shall have:

a) reviewed the status of operationalisation of the AGA since its establishment in 2012

b) reviewed the status of implementation of the AGA Strategic Plan 2015 – 2017;

c) developed a final draft of the AGA Roadmap 2018 - 2020

d) developed the AGA Implementation Framework 2018 – 2020

e) developed the M&E Framework

DELIVERABLES

The following responsibility matrix presents the minimum different outputs of the assignment at six stages and the responsibility of the Consultant.

S/N

Stage

Task

Responsibility

Outputs

Inception

Desk review of working

documents (policy and legal documents)

Consultant

Inception report

Evaluation of the AGA process since inception

Meetings and consultations with AGA Platform Members