by Francis Ameyibor

Accra, July 25, AfricaNews – The Government has pledged has pledged 200,000 United State dollars to the African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF).
The amount is to help finance the Foundation’s Strategic Medium-Term Plan (SMTP), 2007-2011, Dr. Anthony Akoto Osei, Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, stated in a statement made available to AfricaNews in Accra on Friday.
The ACBF required an amount of 350 million US dollars to fully implement its strategic medium term plan. The 21 member countries had so far raised 200 million dollars.
In acknowledgement of the pledge, Dr. Edwin N. Forlemu, ACBF Executive Secretary expressed the Foundation’s “deepest gratitude for this clear demonstration of support and ownership of ACBF and its ideals by Ghana.
“We fervently hope to be worthy of the confidence reposed in the Foundation through this pledge, and we look forward to co-operating more closely with Ghana as we seek to address and overcome the daunting capacity challenges confronting the Continent.”
Dr Forlemu said the pledges by African governments to ACBF are important because they reflect their ownership of the institution and the importance that they attach to capacity building as a development priority on the Continent.
He said ACBF’s role would become even more central to the development processes of many African countries especially in light of such new challenges as HIV/AIDS, leadership development, gender mainstreaming, conflict management and peace building, climate change, food security, electoral process reform, population growth and migration.
Dr Forlemu said ACBF has committed close to 390 million dollars to capacity building since its establishment in 1991 as Africa’s premier capacity-building institution.
Its mission is to build sustainable human and institutional capacity for sustainable growth, poverty reduction and good governance in Africa.
The ACBF had over the years contributed about 22 million dollars for various interventions in Ghana through the Centre for Policy Analysis, (CEPA); the Institute for Democratic Governance (IDEG); and the Economy of Ghana Network (EGN), which is hosted by the Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER), University of Ghana-Legon.
Ghana is also the centre of four ACBF-supported regional training programs and institutions, namely: the Economic Policy Management (EPM) Training Program, which is located at the University of Ghana- Legon.
The rest were the Public Sector Management Training Program (PSMTP), which is being implemented by the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA); the Association of African Universities (AAU); and the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF).
The ACBF intervenes in six core competency areas; economic policy analysis and management, financial management and accountability, strengthening and monitoring of national statistics, public administration and management.
Others include strengthening of the policy analysis capacity of national parliaments, and professionalization of the voices of the private sector and civil society.
The Foundation currently has 45 Full Members comprising four international development institutions – the African Development Bank, the United Nations Development Programme, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund).
The ACBF member countries are Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Canada, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo (Brazzaville), Congo (DRC), Côte d’Ivoire, Denmark, France Gabon, and Ghana.
Others are Greece, India, Ireland, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, the Netherlands, Niger, Nigeria, Norway, Rwanda, Sao Tomé & Principe, Senegal, Sudan, Swaziland, Sweden, Tanzania, Uganda, the United Kingdom, the United States of America, Zambia and Zimbabwe).