IBP, the International Budget Partnership has set up its regional office for French-speaking Africa in Dakar.

The International Budget Partnership (IBP) is strengthening its presence in Africa with the establishment of a regional platform dedicated to French-speaking countries. Named IBP French-speaking Africa, it will support governments, parliaments, oversight institutions, civil society organizations, and technical and financial partners.

The regional office will cover Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Madagascar, Mali, Niger, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Senegal, Chad, and Togo. It will encourage the sharing of experiences, the production of evidence-based data, and dialogue between public institutions and civil society.

This institutional development extends work that has been ongoing for several years from Senegal. Since 2018, IBP has been building a network of actors focused on transparency, public finance control, and citizen involvement in budget decisions in French-speaking Africa.

A regional platform for eleven countries

During the launch webinar, IBP’s Executive Director, Ana Patricia Muñoz, reminded attendees that the organization works with partners in over 100 countries to promote a more transparent and equitable mobilization and use of public resources.

According to her, transparency should not be limited to the publication of budget figures and documents. It should concretely improve the living conditions of the population, especially marginalized communities, through better access to health, water, sanitation, and other essential services.

The organization intends to particularly strengthen data production with communities and then utilize this information in dialogue with national and local authorities. This approach aims to better identify needs, develop tailored solutions, and ensure they are considered in public policies.

For Maleine Amadou Niang, regional director of IBP French-speaking Africa, the new structure is built on two principles: proximity and performance. He believes that budget reforms cannot yield sustainable results without a presence among the population and institutions responsible for managing or overseeing public resources.

The choice of a French-speaking regional organization is also explained by the closeness of administrative and legal systems, as well as the existence of shared community frameworks, particularly within the West African Economic and Monetary Union and the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa.

“French-speaking African countries share common institutional frameworks, but also similar challenges regarding transparency, participation, and accountability,” highlighted Maleine Amadou Niang. The goal is to enable actors from different countries to learn from each other and replicate reforms that have already yielded results.

Benin presented as a regional reference

The launch of the regional office was marked by a speech from Rodrigue Chaou, the Beninese minister in charge of Budget and Public Service. He presented Benin’s trajectory in terms of budget transparency and the reforms that have allowed the country to enhance its performance.

According to the results of the 2025 Open Budget Survey, Benin’s transparency score increased from 1 point in 2012 to 77 points in 2025. Since 2023, the country has also gained 21 points in citizen participation and 11 points in institutional oversight.

Rodrigue Chaou attributed these results to the continuity of reforms initiated by the Beninese administration. He notably cited the systematic and timely publication of budget documents, the gradual opening of the budget process to citizens, and the integration of gender-sensitive budgeting.

“Budget transparency is never a definitive gain. It is an ongoing task,” he stated, emphasizing the continuity of teams, reforms, and political support.

The representative of the Beninese Ministry of Budget also detailed several innovations implemented by the country. These include the publication of a multiannual presentation of receipts, the assessment of the impact of new fiscal measures, and the improvement of information regarding fiscal expenditures.

Benin also publishes regular reports on budget execution, accompanied by data on gender-sensitive expenditures, climate change, and the maintenance of public investments. Meetings are organized with civil society organizations to analyze revenue mobilization and expenditure execution.

The modernization of tax and customs administrations, the digitization of services, the standardization of invoices, and the interconnection of databases have also been highlighted among the reforms that have improved the reliability of financial information.

Progress still insufficient in several countries

Despite the advances made, the results of the Open Budget Survey highlight significant shortcomings in sub-Saharan Africa. Only 15% of assessed countries publish minimal information on fiscal expenditures, including exemptions granted by the state.

Only 12% of countries provide satisfactory information on the projected composition of their debt. Among the French-speaking countries studied within the framework of the 2025 pilot project on debt, only Benin publishes a borrowing plan aligned with its budget. None publish an annual debt audit.

The Director of Public Finances and Domestic Taxation for the UEMOA, Abass Habasso Traoré, indicated that member states have made progress in transposing community directives adopted in 2009. However, their effective implementation remains incomplete.

The main difficulties concern the publication of contracts between administrations and companies, conventions related to the exploitation of natural resources, public service concession contracts, and reports on fiscal expenditures.

Shortcomings also persist in the declaration of the assets of public officials, the publication of information on debt, and the effective functioning of audit courts.

The UEMOA is considering revising its texts to incorporate new requirements for transparency, oversight, and public debt management. This reform must specifically take into account the financial vulnerabilities that have emerged in several countries in the region.

Civil society demands institutionalized participation

The weakness of citizen participation was a significant topic in discussions. For Charlie Martial Ngounou, Executive Director of AfroLeadership, citizens and civil society organizations still do not have enough space to engage in budgetary processes.

He believes that this situation is not only a procedural problem but also a political and administrative culture that still struggles to consider citizens as genuine actors in public management.

The head of AfroLeadership advocated for the creation of permanent consultation and participation mechanisms. These frameworks should be integrated into the budgetary calendar and allow women’s, youth’s, disabled individuals’, and community organizations to contribute to decisions.

According to him, civil society organizations should no longer be seen merely as observers or as opponents to governments. Their understanding of local realities and their closeness to communities can assist administrations in better identifying needs and improving the effectiveness of public spending.

The president of the Finance and Budget Control Commission of the National Assembly of Senegal, Chérif Ahmet Dicko, reminded everyone of Parliament’s role in reviewing, adopting, and overseeing the execution of financial laws.

Deputies have access to various tools for controlling the use of public resources, including ministerial hearings, written and oral questions, investigative commissions, and information missions. The partnership with IBP should enhance their capacity to analyze budget documents and evaluate public policies.

Fiscal justice and gender-sensitive budgeting

IBP French-speaking Africa also plans to strengthen its interventions in the fiscal domain. The organization is already conducting a program dedicated to fiscal equity, domestic resource mobilization, and capacity building for non-traditional actors in the fiscal ecosystem.

The program will be extended to several French-speaking countries. It will focus on fiscal transparency, gender-sensitive taxation, digital and environmental taxation, and the participation of African organizations in international discussions related to the reform of the global tax system.

In Cameroon, gender-sensitive budgeting is gradually being integrated into program budgets. Sophie Boumsong, head of the Budget Reform Division at the Cameroonian Ministry of Finance, explained that this approach does not constitute a separate budget.

It rather involves identifying the specific needs of different population groups and integrating them into planning, resource allocation, and evaluating public policies.

In the agricultural sector, for example, support policies must consider the differences between activities predominantly undertaken by men and those where women are strongly represented. The goal is to ensure that subsidies and public investments do not only benefit certain forms of production.

The regional office now intends to assist states, parliaments, oversight institutions, and citizen organizations on public debt, taxation, financing of social services, budget performance, citizen participation, and access to information on the management of public funds.