Executive Secretary,
Chairman of the Interim Commission of the African Union, Mr. Essy,
Ministers,
Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is my great privilege today to open the Thirty-Sixth ECA Conference of African Ministers of Finance, Planning and Economic Development here in Addis Ababa.

This meeting marks a special occasion - as it is the first time - that we meet back-to-back in the Annual Meetings of the Economic Commission for Africa and the African Development Bank.

Allow me - in that regard - to thank the Executive Secretary of the ECA and the President of the ADB for their determined efforts to make these back-to-back meetings a reality. I am certain that we will all benefit from the productive environment that this special arrangement creates.

Dear Colleagues,

Seven months ago, I had the pleasure of welcoming most of you to Johannesburg, South Africa, for the 2002 Annual Meeting of this Conference. Due to the short period of time since we last met, the Executive Secretary of the ECA in consultation with the Deans of African Ambassadors in Addis Ababa decided to maintain the Bureau for the sake of continuity. That means that South Africa will be chairing the meeting, Cameroon is first vice-chair, Ghana second vice-chair, Kenya third vice-chair, and Sudan rapporteur.

In Johannesburg, we resolved to move from vision to action in the implementation of NEPAD. We therefore gave primacy to several actions that would (1) anchor the objectives of NEPAD into national and regional programmes; (2) engage stakeholders to enhance ownership of development strategies; and (3) move quickly on the African Peer Review Mechanism.

It is with great satisfaction that we recognize the decision by the NEPAD Heads of State Implementation Committee, on 5 March this year, to adopt the African Peer Review Mechanism.

Africa now has an African-owned and African-driven mechanism to share experiences, find best practice and instill successful efforts to meet our development goals.

More than 10 countries have already acceded to the mechanism. This is both an encouragement and a testimony to Africa's willingness to accept responsibility for the development of our continent. I am sure that we will soon be welcoming more African countries to take part of this initiative.

In the context of the African Peer Review Mechanism, our leaders are committed to improving democracy and political governance; adopting prudent economic governance and management measures; ensuring effective corporate governance and adopting the MDGs for development programming.

As the Ministers of Finance, Planning and Economic Development we will be at the epicenter of this process, and we therefore have a particular responsibility towards making mutual accountability a reality.

In return, our development partners, through the Monterey Consensus among other initiatives, have committed to enhancing the quality, quantity and predictability of ODA. They will also work towards ensuring that all policies affecting African development prospects, including market access and debt relief, are consistent with supporting Africa's efforts to achieving the MDGs.

In that regard, the Governors will have an occasion tonight, here in Addis Ababa, to discuss the IFF. I hope that most of us will be available for that meeting, which will be attended by the Secretary of the UK Treasury.

Dear Colleagues,

Today, we must build on the success of the last session of this Conference, and on the progress made in implementing NEPAD.

The programme before us will help advance our commitment to establish more effective partnerships on the continent and with our international partners. For that purpose, the ECA Secretariat has prepared a thought provoking issues paper on the theme: "Towards greater policy coherence and mutual accountability for development effectiveness".

Monitoring performance and taking corrective measures, when needed, is an important aspect of ensuring that we undertake the right policies, that we are on track to achieve our common goals, and that resources are not wasted.

Let us not forget, in that regard, that war is the antithesis of development, and that therefore, war deepens poverty.

We need to be pragmatic. Partnerships are about changing behaviours - both of the recipient countries as well as the donors. It is also about taking responsibility - at our national level - to develop coherent poverty reduction strategies and to facilitate more effective cooperation around our development goals. There is unlikely to be constructive international mutual accountability, if we do not internalize critical self-assessment and self-improvement into our own efforts of developing our economies.

Colleagues,

I suggest we use our time together here today to commit ourselves, along side the ECA, to advance the principle of mutual accountability. We must ask ourselves: What will work for us? What actions can and should be taken at the national level to create the foundation for fruitful partnerships? How can we create a cost-effective mechanism that draws on existing institutions and initiatives - that complements and not duplicates. What should be the role of the ECA?

We will also be looking at the ongoing reforms of the IMF. It is of tremendous concern to us that the IMF is currently considering to divide the Africa Department into two. Will it be along old colonial lines, or into north and south? We don't know. What we know, is that Europe is not being divided, nor is America. Europe is in fact being unified as the former Eastern Europe joins into the European Union. I think it is time for decisions in the IMF no longer to be imposed on us, but to derive from consultation with us.

Another issue is the HIV/AIDS pandemic, and the macroeconomic impact it is having on our economies.

Part of our meeting here is also to consider the statutory issues regarding the governance and work of the ECA Secretariat. The issues before us, in this regard, include consideration of the Annual Report of the Secretariat, and the endorsement of its work programme for the next biennium. Lastly, we will consider the note by the Secretariat on the review of the work of ECA since 1996, which we requested at the last meeting in Johannesburg.

Fortunately, the Committee of Experts has looked at these issues in detail. In their recommendations, they have come up with important ideas on how best the ECA can support African countries in addressing their capacity constraints. We must follow their example to make these meetings truly result-oriented and fruitful in support of the achievement of the vision of NEPAD and the African Union.