Monrovia, Liberia – Augustine Kpehe Ngafuan, Liberia’s Minister of Finance and Development Planning, has advocated for more Africans to work at the World Bank during the 2024 Annual Meetings of the World Bank/International Monetary Fund.
The call came from Minister Ngafuan, who presided over the 28th Statutory Meeting of the World Bank Group’s Africa Group 1 Constituency Panel Meeting, which took place in Washington, DC, on Tuesday, October 22.
The Panel meeting was organized in advance of the Wednesday, October 23, 2024, meeting of the Africa Group 1 Constituency, which consists of 22 African World Bank member nations. Zambia, Malawi, Zambique, and Ethiopia are also members of the Panel, which is led by Liberia.
He emphasized that more chances for Africans to engage with the Bank at all levels are necessary. The low disbursement rate, which indicates the poor pace of World Bank project implementation in member nations, also sparked contentious debates at the Panel conference.
Panelists cited a number of reasons for the issue, such as the inability of nations to achieve their counterpart financing commitments and resettlement action plans, the delay in the establishment of project implementation units, and the legislative confirmation of World Bank loan agreements.
In order to ensure that World Bank projects are implemented more quickly in the Constituency’s member countries, Minister Ngafuan urged the office of the Executive Director to encourage the sharing of experiences among Constituency members. This would allow countries with relatively higher disbursement rates to share their experiences, allowing low-performing countries to learn from the high performers.
‘’Let’s find a way of sharing experiences as a constituency.”
Dr. Floribert Ngarukogave, the Group Executive Director of the World Bank, provided the Panel Members with updates on a number of topics, including the medium-term strategy’s implementation, the IDA21 replenishment, and human resource issues, such as hiring an alternate executive director and staffing the executive director’s office.
In closing, Finance Minister Ngafuan expressed gratitude to the World Bank and Panel members for their dedication and devotion. Additionally, he urged the newly appointed Executive Director to aggressively pursue the issues and suggestions raised at the Panel discussion.
A small group of governors, including the chairman and vice chairperson, make up the African Group 1 Constituency Panel Meeting, which is tasked with managing constituency matters during a two-year period.
