Elections, Congolese style.

On November 28^th 2011, the Democratic Republic of the Congo held its only 2^nd ever democratic elections for the post of President and for the 500 posts in the national legislature. Now, more than 6 weeks later and after the re-installation of Joseph Kabila as president, accusations about the legitimacy of the process continue to reverberate around the entire country and beyond.

Conducting elections in a country almost as big as the whole of Western Europe but with virtually no infrastructure was always going to be difficult and questions were raised weeks before the poll over whether or not enough time was being allowed to set up the polling stations and distribute all of the voting materials. CENI, the national electoral monitoring commission, insisted that it could be managed but on Election Day, it was reported that numerous polling stations failed to open due to absence of voting papers. There were perhaps fewer outbreaks of violence than had been feared but where, in some constituencies, the ballot paper was the size of a tabloid newspaper due to the high number of candidates, it was unrealistic to expect that voting could be completed in a single day. When it came to counting the results, 100% turnout in favour of one candidate or another, as has been alleged in some constituencies, has to be suspicious, while it is also alleged that the entire collection of ballot boxes disappeared altogether in other constituencies, before votes could be counted.

Post-MDG update

Snippets of political intelligence, updates and analysis on post-2015 from my various meetings, reading and correspondence over the last few weeks…

The official UN process is kicking off 
We’ve been told to watch out for Ban Ki Moon’s speech on 25^th January, where he will be presenting his priorities for his second term.  Beyond 2015 have been pushing for this inauguration speech to be the time when the SG establishes a post-MDG agreement as a major strategic priority. 

The new UN Task Team on post-MDGs, coordinated by UNDP and UNDESA, met for the first time last week.  It’s a big group – all the UN departments as well as the Bretton Woods Institutions, OECD and others.  The Task Team has been mandated to produce a report on post-MDGs for the Secretary General at the end of May, doing groundwork for the High Level Panel which will be appointed in June.  Then they will disband.

UNDP have got their proposal for a 50 country consultation on post-MDGs signed off.  They are putting together a workplan by end of Jan/early Feb with the specifics, including which countries, and which themes for the planned ‘thematic’ consultations.  The expectation is that these will be quite heterogeneous exercises – led by the UN country teams according to the context.  Sounds like we can expect a wide variety of approaches, for better and for worse.  There is clarity that these will be multi-stakeholder processes including a whole range of different groups – and that these will *not* primarily be focused on grassroots, community-level engagement with people living in poverty.  This is, however, being planned elsewhere (contact me for info).

Rio +20 Jabberwocky
The Zero Draft of the Rio+20 outcome document was leaked last week.  It talks, amongst many other things, about Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which have been put forward by Colombia (see paragraph 105-110) and are one of the few concrete proposals currently circulating as a potential post-MDG framework.

Are the SDGs going to be combined with development goals to form a post-MDG framework?  Are they going to form a separate, complementary set of targets?  Will there be two sets of goals, which are both part of one ‘post-2015 agenda’?  Are they, on their own, a proposal for a new set of MDGs?  The zero draft keeps every option open, twisting its text in circles to the point of Jabberwocky: “We consider that the Sustainable Development Goals should complement and strengthen the MDGs in the development agenda for the post-2015 period, with a view to establishing a set of goals in 2015 which are part of the post-2015 UN Development Agenda”.  I think that is clear as mud.

“Focus on the inter-governmental process”
On overall advocacy tactics, I’ve been given a strong steer to expect and focus on an inter-governmental process.  Increasing sense that this won’t be a question of UN technocrats going away to write a framework to which governments then agree.  National governments will be setting the agenda, and so they are the ones that advocacy groups need to influence.  If this is going to be a government-to-government affair, the strategy is to influence national governments; build bilateral coalitions; then build international momentum. 

This is surely the ideal world scenario for how international agreements ‘should’ be negotiated, but it does sound quite optimistic.  National governments will anticipate and pre-empt how their proposals will be received internationally, so work pitched at this level will be important to keep ambition levels high.  But it’s an important message nonetheless – and one which could give much clearer focus to civil society groups trying to influence a post-MDG framework.  

The UK context
Talking of national focus, there has been some interesting developments in the UK recently as the post-MDG issue was raised in parliament.  Gareth Thomas, who was the Minister of State for International Development under the Labour Government (now in opposition) led the questioning of Stephen O’Brien, the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for International Development.

 The full text of the debate is here.  Some encouraging acknowledgement of CAFOD’s work, of our colleagues at other agencies, and Beyond 2015 (Gareth Thomas praised our “interesting and thoughtful set of essential must-haves”).  The CIGI and IFRC goals, which I contributed to last year, also picked up attention. 

 Some increasing discussion, both in the debate above and elsewhere, about how the UK could use its position as chair of the G8 next year to take forward post-MDG discussion.  Much acknowledgement of the need to maintain a UN lead, but reflection starting on what kind of opportunity, if any, this forum might present for the debate.  A delicate set of issues – and a good example of the dilemmas involved in an intergovernmental process where different governments have different relationships to power.

 If you want to know more details, or discuss any of the above, I’ll be online on Skype at 12:00 GMT on Tuesday 17^th January for live SMS chat.   My skype name is “amypollard”.

 

 

Snap! When aid to conflict-affected states gets un-conflicting

The International Development Committee has kicked off the New Year with a report on “Working Effectively in Fragile and Conflict Affected States: DRC and Rwanda” .  There are some strong resonances with the arguments CAFOD made in 2010 on how the UK should be spending its bilateral aid money.  Who knows whether they’ve read our stuff or not (it might be that we’ve both been influenced by the same third parties) – but there are a number of policy ‘snap’ moments.

The IDC report leads with same key message as CAFOD:  That the rationale for why some countries get more aid money than others needs to be made explicit.  This is particularly important to address the issue of whether the UK’s security interests are playing a part in aid allocations – a critical concern in fragile and conflict affected states.

Last year we also scrutinised the then Defence Secretary, Liam Fox, when he complained that the requirements on aid transparency would make life more difficult for the MOD.  The IDC are on the same page when they point out the need for clarity on whether activities are eligible as aid or not, especially when other government departments are spending this money.

CAFOD made a specific submission on the Democratic Republic of Congo ahead of the Bilateral Aid Review, and there are several resonances with this document and the IDC report.  We share recommendations to emphasise community level development rather than exclusively focusing on government systems, and call for the transparency and accountability of the mining sector.

A report on conflict that is, on these issues at least, distinctly un-conflicting.  Whether by coincidence or influence, these emerging areas of consensus may offer a few stepping stones of shared ground in a policy area where this is often hard to come by.

Turning a camel into a thoroughbred

It’s tempting fate to say anything is a done deal at the UN climate negotiations, but as this year’s talks in Durban (Conference of the Parties or COP 17) draw to a close, the signs are looking good for the new Green Climate Fund.

 In Cancun last year, developed countries promised $100 billion in new funds to help poorer countries cope with the impacts of a changing climate and build low carbon development paths. They also promised the new Fund to channel a significant amount of the money.

A committee has been working throughout this year to design the Fund and its Chair, South African Planning Minister Trevor Manuel, presented their recommendations to the COP last week. The Green Climate Fund is a must for poorer countries and is supported by most parties. Host South Africa has invested political capital in launching the Fund at Durban and worked hard to make sure its draft governance mechanism is adopted, with a clear timetable for implementation in 2012.

There are still real concerns over how the Fund will work and whether it will deliver for countries at the forefront of climate change. Talk here is of a “balanced” or “middle ground” governance instrument - for which read a fragile and imperfect compromise that leaves substantive issues for the new Board to sort out next year. A negotiator from Singapore put it more colourfully: if you design a horse by committee, you end up with a camel but you hope it can still gallop.

The UK must do more to fight corruption

It has been estimated that corruption causes up to $1 trillion each year to flow out from developing countries into the rich world. This deprives the countries most in need of valuable revenue and has devastating impacts on their citizens’ quality of life. 

Today is International Anti-Corruption Day and CAFOD have joined with likeminded NGOs through BOND’s anti-corruption working group. We are calling on the UK government to do more to tackle the role that UK banks and companies play in fuelling and facilitating the corruption which can undermine development overseas.

CAFOD has welcomed steps taken by the UK government to date, particularly the implementation of the Bribery Act 2010 and calls on the Government to continue following through with the necessary steps to:

• Ensure there are sufficient dedicated resources available to enforce the Bribery Act
• Enforce UK anti-money laundering laws
• Extend the UN Convention Against Corruption and UK Bribery Act to all Crown Dependencies and Overseas Territories.
• Produce a transparent cross-government anti-corruption strategy under the responsibility of UK Anti-Corruption Champion, Rt Hon Ken Clarke MP. 

A number of other recommendations are made in our full report, such as improving enforcement of know-your-customer rules by banks and other service providers including accountancy firms so that they do not mistakenly handle corrupt money and also the need to better publicise protection promised to whistleblowers to ensure that much more corrupt behaviour comes to light and can be challenged.

Japan’s Post-2015 idea: the “Pact for Global Wellbeing”

Discussions about what should happen after the Millennium Development Goals are becoming two-a-penny, but concrete proposals about what exactly should come after 2015 are still relatively thin on the ground.

Some say that this is no bad thing - arguing that it is premature to look at specific goals before proper reflection has been done on what the fundamental purpose of a new framework should be; and we have interrogated the assumption that it should be replaced by goals (rather than some other instrument).

 This is eminently sensible in theory, but is it likely – or even desirable – that a policy issue as complex as post-2015 could be negotiated in such a methodical, sequential manner?  The post-2015 arena is arguably the ultimate forum in which to illustrate that policy-making is a realm of complexity rather than predictable, linear causality.  The political, technical and strategic challenges of this agenda must all proceed simultaneously – and those seeking a strong and legitimate successor to the MDGs must work iteratively between all three.

And so it was fascinating to meet with officials from the Japanese International Cooperation Bureau and Ministry of Foreign Affairs the other week to hear about an idea that they have put on the table.  Japan has been one of the first governments to show interest in the post-2015 agenda, hosting a small meeting in June on the issue despite the devastating Tsunami just months earlier.

Following up from that meeting, Japanese officials have developed a proposal for discussion – the Post MDGs “Pact for Global Wellbeing” (see picture).

They described to me how the Pact for Global Wellbeing had been written to take on board Beyond 2015’s essential must-haves.  “Human Security”, they explained, was an effort to incorporate rights-based approaches whilst avoiding the legalistic language which many governments object to.  “Inclusive Growth” incorporated the need to address issues of inequality within countries; whilst “Shared Growth” would ensure that growth would benefit not only low income countries but emerging economies and private sector organisations (particularly small businesses, I was reassured).  As a pact for global wellbeing – it would be a framework for all countries, not just ‘low income’ ones.  

I’m not sure if they cracked it just yet though.  The 1-page proposal has a lot of components and is difficult to interpret as a coherent whole.  There is a worrying arrow joining “ODA 0.7% of GNI” to “Growth”, which seems to suggest firstly that all aid is about creating growth; and secondly that the only input for creating growth is aid.  There isn’t much in the proposal to show how the Pact for Global Wellbeing would lever fundamental policy changes at a national and international level.   

But it’s helpful to get something on the table – it gives others something concrete to work with, and if approached in the right spirit will enable the ‘trial and error’ which will be essential in such a process.  More fundamentally, it demonstrates that major international governments like Japan are starting to think seriously about the debate and prepared to invest resources in moving it forward.  Given the current lack of political leadership around post-MDG planning – with the UN General Assembly only recently discussing the issue for the first time - this is a welcome impetus.  

So what do you think of the Pact for Global Wellbeing?  Any predictions for its fortunes?  Will this proposal be built on and developed or quietly ignored?   

 

Social protection and small businesses – missing the obvious

Social protection has risen rapidly up the policy agenda and rightly so, the benefits of “just giving money to the poor” are important.

For example, it helps to mitigate risks which prevent poor people making the most out of their livelihoods and it helps to overcome shocks with otherwise cause them to suffer long-term impacts from short term shocks. Small business owners that CAFOD interviewed to inform its “Think Small” report informed us that they undertook several different kinds of activities because the market was not always good for any one of them (undermining their efficiency and profitability). We know from economic crises that short term shocks can cause losses in health or education that affect economic prospects long-term (as well as human ones). Having something to fall back on can stop these barriers to successful livelihoods for the poorest.

A lack of demand – simply having no one to sell to – was also a barrier to small business owners who didn’t have the skills, connections or capital to sell except locally. Injecting cash into the local economy through social protection helps here too.

Boosting inclusive growth is cited as a key objective in the renewed interest in social protection by policy makers – so why are the needs of small businesses run by poor men and women so little evident in new proposed strategies of the World Bank or G20 discussions?

Most social protection schemes do not help these poor entrepreneurs – because they are in the informal sector which is poorly served by government safety nets and schemes. This despite the fact that these enterprises make up the majority of employment opportunities for poor men and women, as well as provide a de facto safety net for the majority who are not reached by government schemes.

This should be a critical area of review for the World Bank, G20 and other donors as well as national governments.

However, it is also important that the renewed interest in social protection as a means to boost inclusive growth, does not detract from social assistance programmes, such as pensions or benefits to other vulnerable groups. These can help small businesses if they are spent locally, especially if payments are systematic, sufficient and over the longer term.

Analysing the impacts of social protection on local markets and poor people’s livelihoods is important and under-researched. There is too little monitoring of who money goes to or how, let alone how it is affecting the local economy. As well as direclty helping poor entrepreneurs to have the confidence to invest and manage risk directly, we also need to better understand how who we give money to and what instruments are used affect their economic prospects and design interventions bearing this in mind.

Will women always be a bit on the side for the World Bank?

At the London launch of the World Bank’s latest report on gender today, one of its contributors praised the report as being a departure from previous “just add women and stir” approaches to gender in development policy and practice.

 There is much to be welcomed in the new report, in particular recognising the importance of the economic empowerment of women and tackling the barriers in formal, informal, economic and social institutions that can prevent it.

But the report is short on action – a challenge that needs to be picked up by Bank staff, member countries and civil society to make sure that the good analysis gets put into practice.

As the title of this blog suggests, this doesn’t mean just doing a few extra things to help women, but instead truly shifting thinking, policy, practice and the incentives, measurements and targets that guide policies and reforms.

A good example of a case for reform are the Doing Business rankings of the World Bank. Back in 2008, these were criticized as being gender-blind. A lack of data and methodological limitations of constructing the rankings have meant that three years on, they remain that way – although we now have a side report on business women and the law. It doesn’t receive a fraction of the marketing support, media attention or policy influence that the main rankings do. Despite making up a significant majority of small-scale entrepreneurs in poor countries, women remain a bit on the side.

Does it matter if we are doing both sets of things – the ones for women and the ones for the “mainstream” business community? The answer lies in opportunity costs, an issue raised by one of the commentators at today’s launch.

This year’s gender report lays out a raft of things that should be done to help women become more successful in their economic life – they are only marginally touched upon by the Doing Business rankings. If the profile of these essential reforms is sidelined by gender-blind, conventional economic policy tools like the doing business rankings, governments simply cannot do their best – either for women or the economy at large – with the limited financial and human resources at their disposal.

DR Congo Elections – a new beginning?

November 28^th 2011 will be a very significant day in the lives of the citizens of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC): for only the second time in their 50years of independence, they will be able to take part in free and fair elections. For more than 30 years, the country was ruled by the tyrant Mobutu Sese Seko, who prioritised lining his own pockets and those of his family and friends; there was turmoil in the country following his overthrow in 1997 and much of the country was engulfed in conflict until 2006, when the first elections were held. Conflict still persists in Eastern Congo and many tens of thousands of people live in fear of armed militia active along the borders with Congo’s neighbours.

Elections in the DRC are no mean feat to accomplish. The country is vast and the infrastructure is almost non-existent. Much of the travel and movement of goods in the interior of the country is by river, but a journey from Kisangani in the East to Kinshasa, the capital can take up to three weeks to complete. This is fine if you are not in a hurry, but for the rapid distribution of voting cards or for bringing them together for counting as soon after voting is completed, it is not much use. For the coming elections, there are around 32million registered voters who will be casting their ballots in around 62,000 polling stations. Ballot boxes and voting cards have to be distributed by plane and helicopter to make sure that everything is in place in good time – a task which only the UN has the resources available to achieve.  

Working to make Natural Resources a blessing, not a curse

Twelve of the most mineral-rich countries and six of the most oil-rich countries in the world are defined by the World Bank as Heavily-Indebted Poor Countries (HIPCs). Although these countries are rich in natural resources, their people often continue to live in poverty and conflict. The resource curse is alive and well.

Arriving into a hotel in Lusaka, Zambia, the coffee table magazine was full of articles about mining companies, reflecting the boom in the industry alongside recent rises in copper prices. The magazine highlighted how philanthropy was funding community projects, but many of those who voted for the newly elected President had higher hopes that he would ensure the mining industry contributed through its core business activities to Zambian development . CAFOD partners, such as the Jesuit Centre for Theological Reflection, have been challenging tax avoidance by extractives companies and calling for a windfall tax on mining companies.