Opportunities, Links and Benefits:

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Opportunities, Links and Benefits
The ANSA network and Regional Institutions
-Perspectives from The Africa Policy Institute
Presented by David Mwaniki Vice President/deputy
CEO APLI
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Africa Policy Institute (APLI)

• Conceived in 2003 by African policy experts,
  former senior government officials, civil society
  thinkers, intellectuals and top media
  practitioners as an independent, pan-African
  think tank to address the perturbing absence of
  Africa-based sound policy research and analysis
  to inform decision making and disconnect between
  leadership and policy.

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APLI Cont
APLI is headquarters in Nairobi, Kenya and has
regional offices in Kampala, Uganda and Pretoria,
South Africa, with field presence in
Algeria, Burundi, Comoros, Democratic Republ
ic of Congo, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Nigeria,
Somaliland, Sudan Zimbabwe.
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Public Accountability

• Area of interest under APLIs thematic thrust of
  Democracy and Governance.
  
• Experience with parliamentary scorecard in
  Uganda.
  
• Currently working with partners in South Africa
  on Legislative governance (Short listed for
  funding to work with Gauteng Legislatures PCO
  audit)
• This is a new area for us and we are currently
  building capacity.
  

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Core Challenges

• Human capacity (the need for legislative and
  governance analysis)
  
• Depth of program
• The Uganda parliamentary score card was a
  snapshot in time rather that a longitudinal
  study.
  
• The planned Gauteng legislature work is limited
  to Party Constituency Offices Capacity and not
  delivery of services.

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Core Challenges Cont..

• Limited funding for public accountability
  activities.
  
• Weak institutional linkages with other like
  minded institutions.
  
• Maintaining balanced and factual perspectives in
  Public accountability work (need to deepen
  analysis).

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The Role ANSA-Africa could Play to Support APLI

• We view ANSA as being able to do the following in
  Support of our PA work
  
• Convening energy (being able to pull together
  like minded agencies, actors and institutions
  involved in Public Accountability)
  
• Capacity building coordinating the
  training/secondment of experts/development of
  tools etc
  
• Knowledge repository guaranteeing access to
  information on Public Accountability

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The Role ANSA-Africa could Play to Support APLI

• New Knowledge/Innovation Hub Capture and
  disseminate new policy and practice and
  innovations generated from implementation of
  programs
• Regional/International Influencing Platform ANSA
  could take the lead on advocacy and influencing
  on Regional and International issues
  
• Fundraising and resource support both funds and
  technical support could be facilitated by ANSA

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Red Flags to Watch Out For

• ANSA-Africas credibility in the region will come
  from the ownership of the process by Africa based
  institutions.
  
• ANSA should focus on proactive demand driven
  initiatives that have legitimacy of the public in
  the relevant countries (avoid the trap of being
  led by the donor)

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Thank YouWebale NyoAsante SanaNgiyabonga Kakulu