African Parliamentarians Network Against Corruption

The African Parliamentarians Network Against Corruption (APNAC) is a network that aims at coordinating and strengthening the capacity of African Parliamentarians to fight corruption and promote good governance. The Network was established during a regional Seminar on “Parliament and Good Governance: Towards a New Agenda for Controlling Corruption in Africa”, held in Kampala, Uganda, in early February 1999. Participants representing each geographical region of Africa acknowledged that corruption can best be controlled by strengthening systems of accountability, transparency and public participation in the governance process of African nations. They further acknowledged the great value of information sharing, maintaining contact with each other and reaching out to Parliamentarians and Parliamentary organizations throughout Africa on the issue of corruption. The instrument chosen was the formation of a network called "African Parliamentarians Network Against Corruption" (APNAC).

Thus, APNAC was born.

The objectives of APNAC

To build the commitment of Parliaments to exercise accountability, with emphasis on financial matters;
To share information learned and best practices;
To undertake projects to control corruption;
To sensitize, educate and make aware to the population of the existence, threat and danger of corruption;
To advocate for inclusion of corruption issues in government priority programs;
To advocate for and encourage improvement of state capacity to timely address and handle matters related to corruption;
To liaise with national and international organizations (including civil society) and institutions on all matters of corruption;
To mobilize internal and external resources to promote anti-corruption programs; and,
To develop links with other oversight committees of Parliament and Parliamentarians across Africa

Organization of APNAC

APNAC is governed by an elected, gender-inclusive Executive Council. APNAC National Chapters may be established in countries with one or more parliamentarians holding APNAC membership. There are currently 18 established national chapters in Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad, DRC, Ghana, Gambia, Kenya, Malawi, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe

Upcoming chapters: South Africa, Angola, Mozambique, Botswana

The Parliamentary Centre and APNAC

The Centre’s relationship with APNAC dates right back to the Network’s creation in 1999, where the Centre, in partnership with the Public Accounts Committee of the Parliament of Uganda, the World Bank Institute, and with support from the British Department for International Development, organized the seminar at which APNAC was launched. A couple of years later when the Centre’s Pan-African Program was started (Africa-Canada Parliamentary Strengthening Program), funded by CIDA, APNAC became its sole beneficiary under the anti-corruption network. The ACPSP has been designed to share lessons, compare experiences, and improve performance by emphasizing cooperative country networking along three themes: poverty-reduction, anti-corruption and gender.

The provision of financial support to the APNAC secretariat during the first phase of the program enabled the Chair to travel in order to perform development missions, as well as provided him with an Assistant. Currently, the Center’s Program finances each of the activities in APNAC’s yearly Work Plans, and will continue support to the Secretariat.

The Parliamentary Centre’s overall goal remains to assist APNAC in achieving its anti-corruption agenda through Parliaments. Getting there will involve, amongst other things, increasing the Network’s policy influence on regional anti-corruption issues, as well as through building and strengthening national APNAC chapters.

The efforts of the first of these strategies were commenced through the APNAC All-Africa regional conference held in November 2003 in Nairobi, Kenya and whose goal focused on revitalizing the Network in those countries where it had been weak, notably in most countries of Western Africa.

The efforts of the second are ongoing and will involve regional workshops and country activities, which will focus on strengthening national chapters. This will be done through the development and enhancement of country anti-corruption strategies as well as through creating linkages with those policy groups and civil society organizations that have an anti-corruption focus.




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