On behalf of the Heads of States of the Mano River Union; I would like to thank you, Mr. Secretary General, for this innovative initiative and for the tremendous efforts made to organize this conference which is the conclusion of conferences in Brussels and Washington.
We thank this important group of world institutional leaders and the International Community for giving us this opportunity to share the experiences of our three Ebola-affected nations: Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia and our hopes for socioeconomic recovery both as individual Mano River Union (MRU) nation states, and collectively as a sub-region.
Each of our countries faced significant economic challenges in 2014 and continues to do so as a result of sharp decline in global prices of our key exports.
With the onslaught of the Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) epidemic, the challenge quickly became a national and sub-regional crisis of unprecedented proportions. Our health systems collapsed, contractors, consultants, and investors left our countries; farms and markets ceased; trade and travel contracted; fiscal balances weakened; revenue declined; and expenditure increased largely on health operations. Moreover, in 2014, our economies contracted and projected growth declined from 4.5% to 1.3% in Guinea; 11.3% to 6% in Sierra Leone and 5.9 % to 0.4% in Liberia.
As national governments and as a sub-region, we took the challenge head on – making difficult decisions that ran contrary to long standing tradition, mobilizing the international community to recognize the disease as a global threat, organizing our best technical professionals to oversee our respective disease management systems, and importantly empowering our communities who were determined to protect their lives and their livelihoods.
Today, we take pride in that we stand on the frontline in challenging this global threat, we take pride that Ebola cases in our different countries have declined compared to where we were several months ago.
We want to recognize all of you in this meeting, and the others around the world, who stood with us as strong bilateral and multilateral partners in the success that we have attained in this fight so far - the size, timeliness and innovative nature of your supports to our nations and sub-region have been truly unprecedented and made the difference in the effectiveness of our response.
We know that overcoming an epidemic in no ways means that we have overcome the disease, nor that we are any safer from further outbreaks, as the recent isolated cases have shown in Liberia. We must therefore put in place the strategy on how to tackle emergency situations and design long-term solution to the healthcare crisis that our countries face today.
As we move from emergency situation to stabilization, all three countries are implementing a robust social and economic recovery program in response to the consequences of the disease.
Our recovery program aims to build upon lessons learned from the successful partnership that government and our development partners established during the Ebola response. It is a process that is fully aligned with our various national development plans. Essentially, we want to make a seamless transition from the response to recovery.
Next, we want to make sure that the capacity of our healthcare system is restored and strengthened to enable it to deliver healthcare services equitably across our different populations. Let me add that strengthening capacity is also important for other sectors that were grossly affected by the outbreak. For example, education, water and sanitation, agriculture, and social protection for our vulnerable populations were amongst some of the grossly affected sectors.
All these sectors are critical to rebuilding and/or strengthening the resilience of our communities, which were the lifeblood of our Ebola response. Building capacity and strengthening the response on ordinary people and communities, which were at the core of our response, must be the target of our recovery efforts.
This requires social mobilization and community participation and assistance for Agriculture to ensure that food security is prioritized. Cash transfers to affected communities as a form of social protection will also form a major part of our recovery efforts.
Trade flows between our respective nations; a key source of livelihood for many disadvantaged women, need to be restored. Given the intensity of the deaths and trauma that the outbreak caused, psychosocial services to affected people and communities will be important to address the mental health disorders that may arise as a result.
Ladies and gentlemen,
No matter what we do in the short term in the effectiveness of response, the important long term response to Ebola will rest in plans and strategies for economic recovery, in support for our transformation goals. We must and we can return to the progress of our pre-Ebola Trauma.
In furtherance of this goal, the 3rd Extraordinary Summit of the Mano River Union held in Conakry on the 28th of June 2015 adopted the Sub-regional Post Ebola Socio-Economic Recovery Program, the priorities and costs of the sub-regional Ebola-Recovery Program, as well as the Institutional and Financing Framework to ensure effective implementation.
The sub-regional plan is clustered into two levels: Level One is estimated at US$1.76 billion, focusing on (i) health, water, sanitation and hygiene; (ii) governance, peace and security; (iii) agriculture, fisheries and food security; (iv) gender, youth and social protection; (v) program management and monitoring, and vi) private sector development. Level Two is estimated at US$2.24 billion focusing on (i) sub-regional roads; (ii) energy access; and (iii) information and communication technology.
Dear Partners, Ladies and gentlemen,
In terms of the Institutional and Financing Framework to ensure effective implementation, we have decided to establish a single Mano River Union Consolidated Ebola Recovery Trust Fund (CERTF), with allocation and disbursement arrangements to be determined by the MRU in consultation with Partners;
In this regard, we urge our partners to adhere to the principles of the New Deal and the Mutual Accountability Framework and we renew our call to the International Community for the cancellation of the debt (of 3.16 billion) and direct budget support to the affected countries.
We also re-echo our call on the World Bank, the African Development Bank, and the United Nations System to support the establishment of a Special Delivery Unit within the MRU Secretariat, backed by a project preparation facility for the preparation of bankable projects for effective implementation of the program.
The national plans as well as sub regional plan submitted, for your support, are inclusive, participative, and cohesive. They were elaborated with a very high level of pertinence and carefulness taking into account all preoccupations of the affected countries for the period of 2015-2017.
Ladies and gentlemen,
In terms of aggregate cost the financing gap is estimated at 7.2 billion US dollars of which 4 billion will finance the sub regional plan.
There is no doubt that the cost is half; the resources required significant. We believe however that this can be achieved through existing bilateral and multilateral commitments supplemented by the allocation of additional resources.
Is this asking too much? We say no because, a strong Mano River Union can be a formidable force for recovery and resilience in the sub-region; a productive, progressive and peaceful Mano River Union which would result from your support will attract private sector investment and capital in our natural resource with ensuring sustainability in our effort and positive impact on regional stability and world trade.
For that, we ask you, our partners, to join us in developing the detailed framework for implementation of the plans giving due respect to priorities in the national and sub-regional plans. On our part, we commit to more efficient allocation of our own resources to a conducive environment for the private sector, to full accountability and to democracy and the rule of law.
The world as a whole has a great stake in how we together respond to this global threat how the next global development agenda, soon to be agreed, contain specific plans for global response to global health crisis in a timely manner. The world is more ever connected than before and virus, diseases just like terrorism, know no boundaries.