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++++ TCSF English Newsletter Extra ++++ March 17, 2008

Viva! Africa: People's Network across Continents
Published by TICAD Civil Society Forum (TCSF)
http://ticad-csf.net/eng/index.htm
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Dear colleagues,
Our English newsletter contains information about TCSF's Activities
and Japanese aid support toward Africa. We hope to strengthen our
network with you by sharing information about our activities.
Thank you.

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NGOs in Japan and Africa present their proposal "Voice 2008
? Recommendations from African and Jananese Civil Society to TIVAD IV"
at the 6th periodical consultationbetween the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs (MoFA) and the TICAD IV NGO network (TNnet) on March 11.
This proposal will also be presented at the TICAD Ministerial
Conference scheduled to be held in Gabon on March 21-22.

The Voices is was compiled by more than 100 African NGOs*1 involved
in the preparatory process of TICAD IV and 35 Japanese member NGOs
of the TICAD IV NGO network (TNnet)*2 . There has never been such
a large cooperative process between NGOs in Africa and Japan before.
Here are the details.

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Africa and Japan Civil Societies' Advocacy Work towards TICAD IV
Announcement of "Voices 2008"in TICAD Ministerial Conference
in Gabon (March 20-21)
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The "Voices 2008" will be officially unveiled at the Civil Society
Session of the Gabon Ministerial Meeting which possesses great
importance for TICAD IV scheduled for May 28th-30th 2008 in Yokohama,
Japan.

In order to reflect the voices of civil societies in TICAD, the Voices
2008 has been drafted as a result of collaboration between TNnet and
African NGOs mainly through dialogues at the Africa Asia NGO network
Nairobi and Tokyo workshops, the October 27th symposium, as well as
two TICAD regional preparatory meetings in Zambia and Tunisia.
The Voices 2008 is organized in line with TICAD IV's 4 areas of
cooperation(economic growth, MDGs, peace consolidation,
environment/climate change) presenting the grassroots perspective based
on actual experiences.

The Civil Society Session will be held right after lunch time for 1
hour on March 20th and aims to promote inclusion of civil society to
the TICAD process, to reflect the voices of civil society in Africa
and Japan to the TICAD preparatory meetings, and to show the
importance of civil society to the TICAD co-organisers and African
governments by contributing to constructive inputs to their discussion.

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Voices 2008 Executive Summary
Recommendations from African and Japanese Civil Society to TICAD IV
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This "Voices" has been produced by African and Japanese civil society
to make specific recommendations to TICAD IV. The original opinions have
been collected from Africa. African and Japanese civil society has made
unrelenting discussions to finalise "Voices". This is the fruit of
over 100 African NGOs and 35 Japanese NGOs.


Preamble:
We, the civil society of Africa and Japan, have organised and participated
in the series of dialogues in the process toward TICAD IV starting from
September 2007. These discussions and the outcomes have been summarised
in this document. Whereas much of Africa has recently been experiencing
positive economic growth, vast majority of people in Africa has yet to
receive its benefit and continue to bear the burden of poverty resulting
from inequality and injustice. Despite the tremendous steps taken, Africa
is the continent furthest away from achieving the Millennium Development
Goals. In addition to the problems of political stability, conflict, and
poor-governance, environmental degradation and climate change are now
posing new challenge.

We are determined to address this state of affairs and present our
concrete and actionable recommendation based on the civil society's
point of view, in line with the themes identified by TICAD as outlined
below.
1. Boosting economic growth
2. Ensuring human security
2-1. Achieving MDGs
2-2. Consolidations of peace and democracy
3. Environmental protection and climate change
4. Establishing TICAD watch process

The above areas are very much inter-related, so the challenges addressed
can only be tackled by an integrated approach with genuine partnership
of a wider range of stakeholders, including various levels of government,
private sectors and civil society. As we recognise that good governance
is the key in order to bring positive changes to the life of the African
people, we calls for the engagement of civil society throughout the
process of deign, implementation, evaluation and monitoring to attain
transparency and accountability in African development.

1.Boosting Economic Growth
We hope that in African countries, economic growth would contribute to
improve people's livelihood and to achieve MDGs. Rising violence,
instability and frustration seen in certain African countries, despite
the realisation of economic growth, such as the ones after presidential
elections, show that economic growth if not matched with social
development would reinforce and deepeninequality which causes social
unrest and damages human security.

The following four issues therefore require attention:
-Enhance human development that are fundamental to poverty reduction;
-Ensure that infrastructure development responds to both social /
livelihood needs as well as broad economic considerations;
-Develop people's productive skills and capacities through for example,
technology transfer; and
-Address social distortions, including gender inequalities.

Therefore, we give the following recommendations to tackle the issues:
-Make concerted efforts to fight corruption;
-Make efforts in reducing social distortions, including gender
inequalities;
-Support CSOs in order to strengthen their role in national and
international policy agenda setting and also empower rural communities;
-Ensure transparency, efficiency, and effectiveness of aid; and
-Support African entrepreneurship, enterprise development and capital
accumulation by preferential trading conditions and promoting
micro-credit/savings among the deprived people.

TICAD IV should propose solutions to reduce both poverty and inequality.
Especially in agriculture sector which has a large working force and is
essential to reduce hunger, a large amount of fund should be invested to
secure food security and to reduce poverty. Moreover this fund should
contribute to empowering rural communities. Therefore we require rural
social institutions such as micro-credit system for the poor and pro-poor
infrastructure development.Also we require the Japanese Government
increases the amount of ODA, and the proportion of Japanese ODA
apportioned to grants.


2.Human Security
We, the civil society of Africa and Japan, believe that human security
should be the basis of state security. In order to attain human security,
human dignity as well as human rights should be ensured. Many African
people, however, suffer from various kinds of human insecurity associated
with fear and unfulfilled basic rights and needs. Their insecurity stems
from unstable political environment, poverty, gender inequality, income
disparity, and ethnic / tribal animosities.We understand that human
security is closely linked to economic growth, sustainable environments,
and robust human development. TICAD should put rights and dignity of
people at the centre of development and their interrelated issues. Basic
human rights should be protected and universal access to basic social
services, such as education, water, and health care should be ensured
through rights-based approach with community-based intervention. In the
efforts to promote dignity of all the people, TICAD must address gender
inequalities and especially respect minorities, including
differently-abled people, the elderly, children and other vulnerable
groups.

We present recommendations toward the donor community,
including the Japanese government and African partners.
In our recommendations, we put emphasis on pro-poor policy to protect
basic human rights; protection of vulnerable population for promotion of their
dignity; civil society's involvement to increase accountability as well as
to promote effective delivery of services; and political stability and good
governance to achieve tangible outcomes from investment.

2.1. Achieving MDGs
In spite of the various efforts taken and some progress made as a result,
recent UN study on Africa and MDGs reveals that, unfortunately, Africa is
the continent furthest away from achieving MDGs. Lack of financial
resources, both in terms of domestic investment and overseas aid, weak
social sector, lack of efficiency, weak political will together with
structural problems such as poverty and conflict, hinder the massive
progress toward MDGs.
Therefore, we request TICAD to:
-Acknowledge that investment in social development and encouraging for
achieving gender equality arethe key to achieve MDGs, and hence to reduce
poverty in Africa; and
-Promote the engagement of civil society as equal partners, throughout the
process of the efforts to achieve MDGs. This is because we know that only
with good governance, transparency and accountability, aid will reach
people who need it most.We make specific recommendations about health,
education and water, which Japanese government articulated as areas of
priority.

We believe that TICAD should act on the following:
-[Education] Support the commitments and efforts of African countries to
ensure education for all of their population.
Cf. This is because the international community affirmed that "no government
seriously committed to achieving Education For All will be thwarted in their
achievement of EFA goals by lack of resources" in the Dakar framework.
-[Health] Support the development and implementation of effective health care
and services in African countries in a manner to harmonise and coordinate them
with existing commitments, plans and strategies endorsed by African Union (AU)
and respective countries.
Cf. Sub-Sahara Africa shows the limited progress toward achieving the three
Health MDGs. SSA accounts for almost half of annual death of 9.8 million children
due to preventable causes, and the lifetime risk of maternal death in this region
is extremely high. Life expectancy has dropped into the upper 30s in some SSA
countries due to infectious diseases including HIV/AIDS and TB, weak health
system and severe shortage of health workers.
-[Water] Allocate more resources in order to fill the access-gap and to ensure
protection, good governance, and equitable supply of water.
Cf. The Human Development Report summarizes the situation in the continent as;
Sub-Sahara Africa is "falling further behind and will account for more than
half of the Global water deficit and just under half of the sanitation deficit".
Key issues include, but not limited to, huge service/access gap, inequality in
service decisions, lack of political will and weak capacity of civil society
as well as local government that results in the lack of transparency and
accountability.

2.2. Consolidation of Peace and Democracy
The civil society of Africa and Japan appreciates the progress to peace in
the continent such as improvement of commitments and the roles of the regional
bodies in Africa for ending many conflicts since TICAD III took place. On the
other hand, we are concerned about some unsolved conflicts and unsettled peace
in post-conflict societies. Old issues such as cross-border conflicts and
election-related conflicts still remain. In addition, the circumstance of
international politics towards Africa seems to be strongly influenced by the
newly emerging discourse of a "war on terror." The main victims of these
conflicts are civilians, particularly women and children. To solve these
violent conflicts, all possible immediate action is required from leaders in
the countries in conflict, from regional organisations, and from the international
community. As past TICAD addressed, conflicts interrupt African efforts for
stable and sustain able development. Recently, there have been more cases that
indicate clear linkages between the problems of development and violent conflicts
in Africa. Specific issues are the new social divide, problems of governance and
accountability, and the issue of identity-based politics. "Do No Harm" policy
continues to be essential in international aid and investment to Africa. Solving
the issues of governance is also necessary.

Consequently, we request the following points:
-Consider economic growth along with the issues of governance, redress of social
disparities, democratisation, and peace, and the same should be applied to private
investors;
-Improve governance in order to avoid identity-based politics, secure freedom of
themedia and activities of civil society, Encourage sound resource management
which bring benefits directly to the people in the society with support from
donors;
-Encourage new donors to participate in the international agreements against
corruption, resource exploitation and others;
-Secure /support free and fair electoral process in order to avoid
centralisation of power to the winner of the election by instituting independent
electoral commissions and guaranteed long-term election observation activities;
-Enforce /support conflict prevention, resolution, and peace-building capacity
of African regional organisations such as AU/NEPAD;
-Strengthen early warning mechanisms and preventive diplomacy;
-Assist efforts for peace consolidation in the post-conflict countries,
not only at national levels but also sustainably at grassroots levels;
-Avoid bringing "war on terror" in Africa; and
-Include women and civil society in peace negotiations and
planning -implementing - monitoring processes of peace-building together with
funding grassroots peace initiatives.

3.Environmental Protection and Climate Change
The environmental change in Africa is attributed to the global climate change
and the domestic socio-economic activities. Due to the high reliance on the
natural environmentfor subsistence and life support, the vast majority of
people in Africa are sufferingfrom poverty much worse than before. Furthermore,
the socio-economic phenomena such asurbanisation and conflicts lead to
pollution, natural resource depletion or the increasing number of refugees.

Hence, we point out the following to be discussed at the coming TICAD IV:
-Enhance institutional, financial and technical capacity of governments and
CSOs in Africa. Promote technical skills in areas of climate dynamics, agriculture,
forestry, and environmental management;
-Provide funding and support for African researchers to access knowledge
or highereducation opportunities, particularly in environmental management;
-Increase the processing and manufacturing in Africa to avoid exploiting and
exporting raw materials; and
-Investigate and promote equitable management of bio-fuel plantations and guard
against the destruction of environmental resources by new plantations that may
reducebiodiversity, damage societal structure and diminish traditional food
production for subsistence.

All of the issues addressed in the Voices 2008 are interrelated. However, since
we know the fact that the poorest and most vulnerable people are the biggest
victims of the climate change, we need to declare the issue of environmental
change to be of much importance for poverty reduction.

Therefore, we request donor community and African governments for:
-Mainstreaming environmental concerns in all African government policies;
-Re-orienting ODA in favour of poverty reduction and environmentally
sustainable development;
-Strengthening regional(SADC, COMESA, ECOWAS), national(government)
and grassroots(CSOs)capacity in environmental management in order to
realise policies in favour of poverty reduction;
-Planning to achieve the target for GHG emission reductions under the Kyoto
Protocol and explore feasible global mechanism for mitigation and adaptation
beyond the protocol; and
-Mainstreaming environmental concerns related to trade and investment, and
address concerns raised by exploitation of GMO-GE technology.

4.Establishing TICAD Watch Process
At TICAD III, implementation of a follow-up mechanism for TICAD was
declared by the former Prime Minister Mr. Junichiro Koizumi. The civil society
of Africa and Japan urges TICAD co-organisers to create this mechanism, and
include civil society fully in its secretariat, committees, and ministerial
meetings (following-up meeting of TICAD).This is essential in order to make
TICAD more action-oriented, effective and inclusive. Civil society also
proposes to create the 'TICAD Watch Process' as an independent social
institution.

To gain support from all stakeholders for this initiative, TICAD should propose
the following points:
-Enhance the constructive engagement of civil society in TICAD and its follow
up process;
-Strengthen capacity building of civil society; and
-Assist the efforts towards maintenance of networking among African civil
society and between African and Asian (including Japanese) civil society.

Gaols of TICAD Watch Process are to:
-Realise a development process that locates African people as active agents.
-Develop an African and Japan CSO Network for promoting African development
and for continued process of TICAD.

*1 TICAD IV-NGO network (TNnet) was established in March 2007
with the aim to enhance information-sharing and communication
among Japanese NGOs towards the 4th Tokyo International
Conference on African Development (TICAD IV) to be held in May 2008
in Yokohama, Japan.
There are 35 Japanese NGOs which are involved with Africa in our
member list (as of February 2008). The goal of TNnet is to reflect the voices
of civil society in TICAD. In order to achieve this goal,
TNnet organises periodical consultations with MoFA;
symposiums and other events targeted at enhancing
understanding of African issues; and implements advocacy
work based on cooperation with civil societies in Africa, member NGOs
of TNnet, and other related organisations. .
TNnet aspires to reflect the voices of civil society in TICAD. We believe
that the following three points are crucial for realising our purposes.
1. Africa should have a true ownership of TICAD
2. Civil society partners should be official participants of TICAD
3. TICAD should be for the people

35 Japanese NGOs:
-TICAD IV NGO Network (TNnet):ASHINAGA / ADEO Japan / Community Action
Development Organisation (CanDo) / Africa Shumpei Kambe Fellowship /
Africa Japan Forum (AJF) / Africa Reconciliation Committee (ARC) /
Africa-Rikai Project / AFRIC Africa (Association for Field Research
Information and Collaboration in Africa) / Our Planet-TV / AIDS
orphanssupport NGO・PLAS / NGO DOJYO / Oxfam Japan / People to People
Aid, Japan / CARE International Japan / Japan Anti-Tuberculosis
Association / Japan NGO Center for International Cooperation /
THE DAPAD FOUNDATION / SUPA=Association of Support for people in West
Africa / Japanese Organization for International Cooperation in Family
Planning (JOICFP) / Space Allies / TICAD Civil Society Forum (TCSF) /
Japan National Assembly of Disabled Peoples' International (DPI-Japan)
/ Association for Aid and Relief, Japan / Japan International
Volunteer Center (JVC) / Foster Parents Plan of Japan (Plan Japan) /
RESULTS Japan / Japan Association of NGOs for Agriculture and Rural
Development / The Baobab Association（The Baobab）/ HUNGER FREE WORLD /
Peace Winds Japan / Hottokenai, Sekai no Mazushisa / Don't Let It Be:
World Poverty -GCAP Japan / Action for Greening Sahel / Yokohama NGO
Network / World Clean Project / World Vision Japan

*2 Over 100 African NGOs contributed to the Voices 2008:
-Civic Commission for Africa (C-CfA):African Development Programme
(ADP), Ghana / Reseau Glegbenu de Social Watch Benin, Benin / Network
Africa Asia (N2A), Cote d'Ivoire / President de l'Association Pour la
Defense des Consommateurs (APDC), Cameroon / Youth Network for MDG,
Madagascar / Civil Society Alternative Process of Sierra Leone (CSAP-SL),
Sierra Leone / The Botswana Council of NGOs (BOCONGO), Botswana /
Mauritius Council of Social Service (MACOSS), Mauritius. / Conseil de ONG d'Appui
au Developpement (CONGAD), Senegal / Christian Relief and Development
Association (CRDA), Ethiopia / Malawi Economic Justice Network (MEJN),
Malawi / Conseil de Concertation et d' Appui aux ONG (CCA-ORG), Mali /
G-20, Mozambique / Pro-Poor Governance Network, Nigeria / MVIWATA,
Tanzania / African Forum and Network on Debt and Development (AFRODAD),
Zimbabwe / PELUM Association/ Reseau des Organisations Paysannes et
de Producteurs Agricoles de l' Afrique de l' Ouest(ROPPA) / Treatment Action
Campaign (TAC) / The Inter-African Committee on Traditional Practices
(IAC) / Global Call To Action Against Poverty (G-CAP) Kenya: Kenya Youth
Education& Community Development program / Education for life institute /
Center for Reforms Management / Action Aid International Kenya (25 NGOs)
-C-CfA Observer NGOs: Hoima Environmental Project (HEP), Uganda / Network
for Good Governance (GNGG), Cameroon / Angolan Action for Development (AAD),
Angola / Development Initiatives Network (DIN), Nigeria / Niger Association
Nigerienne des Scouts de l' Environnement (ANSEN), Niger (6 NGOs)
-NEPAD CSOs Platform: ansedi, Algeria / Mwengo, Tanzania / Clear Women,
Kenya./ Community Aid International, Kenya / Positive Africa, Cameroon & Cote
D' Ivoire / Africa Peace, Benin & Togo / Nangosa, South Africa /
Fncaph-Unaphac, Cameroon / Foscam, Cameroon / Africa Youth Trust, Kenya /
Agropast, Cote D' Ivoire (11 NGOs)
-Other NGO Coalitions: Africa Public Health Alliance & 15% Now Campaign
/ IPPF Africa Region representing 44 Member Associations / African Council
of AIDS Service Organizations (AfriCASO) / the African Civil Society
Coalition on AIDS / Kenya AIDS NGOs Consortium (KANCO) / Kenya Debt Relief
Network (KENDREN) / Global Call To Action Against Poverty(G-CAP) Africa
-Other Independent NGOs: Environment Development Action in the Third World
(ENDA-TM), Senegal / l'UNAPHAC et de la FACAPH, Cameroon / International
Forum for Rural Transport and Development Africa, Kenya / End Water Poverty
Campaign ? West Africa / ANEW ? West Africa / RADDHO / WaterAid West
Africa (7NGOs)
-African Diaspora Coalition: Global African Diaspora Coalition Africa (GLAD)

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