The ECOWAS Commission is holding a Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) capacity-building workshop to enhance the quality of internal results assessments, learning, as well as the reporting processes of its programme implementation.
The Three-Day Workshop which began on the 26th of April, 2023, in Abuja, Nigeria, is also meant to provide support to the Directorates of Political Affairs (DPA), and Strategic Planning and other relevant Directorates on how to improve the quality of their strategic and annual work plans while ensuring that the mainstreaming of gender and youth issues are correctly captured.
Welcoming participants at the start of the Workshop on behalf of DPA, the Head, Mediation and Coordination of Regional Political Affairs Division (MCRPA) Dr. Onyinye Onwuka, stressed the importance of the workshop at a time when the ECOWAS Commission needs to devise urgent and creative ways of facilitating real transformation in Member States through impactful M&E skills.
Supported by the ECOWAS Programme Officer, Conflict Prevention, Mr. Constant Gnacadja, enthused that the workshop will provide support to ECOWAS Directorates beyond enhancing the quality of internal results assessments and reporting to partners, on the implementation of projects/programmes in accordance with ECOWAS Vision 2050, the Community Strategic Framework, and the annual approved work plans.
She thanked the Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA) as well as Tana Copenhagen M&E team for their various roles in advancing the realization of the ECOWAS Community goal of ensuring a more stable, prosperous and peaceful West Africa.
Led by Mr. Stefan Jansen, the facilitators of the workshop, including Maud Eskes and Alessandra Cancedda, made presentations on needs assessment, context analysis and Theory of Change.
There were also groups work enriched by practical examples, including plenary sessions which were held with contributions from participants who shared their past experiences.
These are to be followed by further review of the present reporting format, stakeholder analysis, action planning, and the idea of being comfortable with digital data collection tools as well as data protection techniques and practicable M&E best practices recommendations.
The Workshop provides an opportunity to exchange ideas, while enhancing cross-departmental collaboration and synergy among ECOWAS Conflict Prevention Framework (ECPF) and M&E Focal Points, with an eye on empowering Member States to scale up conflict prevention interventions in the region.
It is part of Denmark’s support to ECOWAS through the Africa Programme for Peace phase IV (APP IV).
About ECOWAS
The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) was established when the ECOWAS Treaty was signed by 15 West African Heads of State and Government on the 28th of May 1975 in Lagos, Nigeria. The ECOWAS region spans an area of 5.2 million square kilometres. The Member States are Benin, Burkina Faso, Cabo Verde, Côte d’Ivoire, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Senegal and Togo.
Considered one of the pillars of the African Economic Community, ECOWAS was set up to promote co-operation and integration, leading to the establishment of an economic union in West Africa to raise the living standards of its peoples, and to maintain and enhance economic stability, foster relations-among Member States and contribute to the progress and development of the African continent.
In 2007, ECOWAS Secretariat was transformed into a Commission. The Commission is headed by the President, assisted by a Vice President, and Five Commissioners, comprising experienced bureaucrats who are providing the leadership in this new orientation. As part of this renewal process, ECOWAS is implementing critical and strategic programmes that will deepen cohesion and progressively eliminate identified barriers to full integration. In this way, the estimated 300 million citizens of the community can ultimately take ownership for the realization of the new vision of moving from an ECOWAS of States to an “ECOWAS of the People: Peace and Prosperity to All” by 2050.