Can the AU Finance its own peace operations, and if so, what would the impact be?

(contribution to the Annual Report of African Union Peace Operations, published in 2018 by the African Union and the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Center)

 

Abstract

 

One of the factors that influence the effectiveness of African Union (AU)-led peace operations is its financing. From its inception the AU had to depend on international partners to finance its peace and security activities. This meant that the AU could only deploy those peace operations its partners were willing to fund. In July 2016 the AU Assembly took a decision to levy a 0.2% duty on eligible imports from non-member states, and to institute a new governance regime for the AU Peace Fund that would enable it to serve as the single account for AU peace and security activities. This decision, if fully implemented, will give the AU the agency and financial means to independently, and in its own interest, manage Africa’s peace and security activities. It will enable the AU to enter into partnerships with the United Nations, European Union and bilateral partners, not out of financial necessity, as is currently the case, but on the basis of strategic considerations. It will also significantly change the dynamics of ownership and responsibility for the AU’s member states. On the other hand, failure to implement this decision will seriously undermine the AU’s credibility and question the commitment of African states to the Union.

 

 

1. Introduction

 

 

A key factor that influences the effectiveness of African Union (AU)-led peace support operations is predictable and sustainable financing. The AU has been unable, to date, to finance its peace and security activities from its own resources. For instance, in 2016 the AU had approximately 40 human rights and military observers deployed in Burundi at a budgeted cost of $18 million. On the other end of the scale, the AU-led mission in Somalia (AMISOM), with approximately 22,000 personnel, is the largest peace support operation of its kind in the world. It has a budget of approximately $900 million per year. The Burundi mission is financed by the EU and the UN Peacebuilding Fund, and AMISOM is financed by the EU, the UN and bilateral donors like the UK, US, Italy, Turkey and China.[2] There has been a few exceptions. For instance, South Africa took responsibility for approximately $110 million of the $140 million cost of the African Mission in Burundi (AMIB) in 2003. Other African countries also made some contributions to the AU missions in the Central African Republic (CAR) and Mali, and the January 2017 mission of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) in the Gambia was self-financed. However, the overall pattern is that the AU has had to rely primarily on its international partners to finance its peace support operations.

 

This is problematic, because the AU’s dependency on external resources denies it the freedom to independently take decisions on the strategic, operational and even tactical aspects of the peace support operations it is responsible for.[3] Without control over the financing of its peace support operations the AU is unable to independently decide when to deploy a peace support operation, or what its mandate and size should be. Any action that has cost implications requires prior negotiation with partners to mobilize the resources necessary for it to be implemented. In other words, the AU lacks the agency to act independently in the area of peace and security.[4] As a result the AU has only been able to undertake those operations where there was a convergence of interests with its partners, i.e. those operations that was in the interests of its partners.

 

This financial dependency on partners is not limited to peace support operations. The AU has become reliant on partners for approximately 98% of its programme budget and 99% of its peace and security expenditure. The financial problems of the AU reached a critical stage in 2015, because the AU used its own operational funds to pay for the start-up costs of establishing the AU mission in Mali (AFISMA), in anticipation that these costs would be reimbursed by the UN or partners, but that did not happen. This has a serious impact on the AU’s cash-flow in 2015, and that year the AU Member States, at both the January and July AU Summits, committed themselves to self-finance 100% of the AU’s regular budget, 75% of its programme budget, and 25% of its peace and security budget, in particular the cost of AU Peace Support Operations, by the year 2020.

 

This commitment was followed-up at AU Summit in Kigali in June 2016. The Summit was devoted to finding the means to operationalise the 2015 self-financing decisions. It was preceded by a one-day head of State-level retreat on financing. The retreat and Summit took a historic decision to implement a 0.2% levy on eligible imports into all AU member states. The projected income from the levy is approximately $1.2 billion, based on projected import figures for 2017, and such and amount will cover almost double the AU’s 2017 budget of approximately $700 million. If fully implemented, this decision will ensure the financial independence of the AU and significantly alter the agency of the AU when it comes to its peace and security activities.

 

In this paper I will consider the challenge faced by the AU to finance its own peace support operations, analyse the 2015 and 2016 decisions on financing, and reflect on the implications of these decisions.

 

2. The Financing of the African Peace and Security Architecture

 

In order to increase its capacity to manage and resolve conflicts, the AU established the African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA) in 2003. The APSA consists of the Peace and Security Council, supported by, amongst others, the Peace Fund, the Continental Early Warning System and the African Standby Force. Operationalising all the elements of the APSA required a considerable investment in institution building and capacity development. The AU member states were not able to do this on their own.[5] The AU thus had to turn to its international partners for support.

 

The AU’s partners were willing to assist the AU develop the APSA as they recognised that a stronger AU will decrease the pressure on, and cost of the United Nations (UN) in carrying out its task to maintain international peace and security.[6] Furthermore, a stable and developing African continent will be a boost for the world economy, create new markets for the AU’s partners, reduce migration, deny a foothold for international terrorism and enhance international peace and security. Significant capacity was developed between 2003 and 2017, including in the area of peace support operations and the African Standby Force (ASF). For example, in 2000, Africa contributed only 10,000 troops to UN peacekeeping operations, but by end 2016 African countries contributed approximately 49,000 troops, i.e. approximately 50% of all UN peacekeepers.[7]

 

Over this same period the AU has also deployed a dozen peace support operations of its own, including to Burundi, the Central African Republic, the Comoros, Mali, Somalia and Sudan. The AU also maintained two Special Political Missions, one in Central Africa and another in the Sahel, and it also had several AU Liaison Offices, including in the Central African Republic, Chad, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, South Sudan and Sudan. The AU Commission also provided strategic, political, technical and planning support to operations authorised by its Peace and Security Council, but carried out by ad hoc security coalitions of Member States, or by Regional Economic Communities (RECs), or Regional Mechanisms (RMs), such as the Regional Cooperation Initiative against the Lord’s Resistance Army (RCI-LRA), the operation against Boko Haram undertaken by the Lake Chad Basin Commission member states and Benin, the Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF), and the G-5 Sahel Force. The total cost of these AU peace and security activities for 2016-2017 is estimated at $1.2 billion.[8]

 

As the AU member states lacked the financial resources needed to develop and run the APSA institutions on their own, they had to turn to their partners for support.[9] At the AU Summit in Maputo in July 2003, the AU called on the EU to establish a facility that could assist it to develop the APSA from funds allocated to African countries under existing cooperation agreements. The EU responded by establishing the African Peace Facility (APF) in March 2004, with an initial sum of €250 million. Since its establishment the APF has been the main source of funding the APSA.[10] According to the EU, 2 billion Euro were allocated to the APF since 2004, of which 1.6 billion Euro were already paid out by the end of 2015.[11] In addition to the EU, various bilateral partners also provided support to the AU, or directly to African Troop and Police Contributing Countries. For instance, at the 2015 UN Peacekeeping Summit, China announced that it would provide $100 million in support of the African Standby Force.

 

In addition to support from the EU and bilateral partners, all the AU’s peace support operations to date have benefited from some form of UN assistance and support, including light and heavy support packages, UN Trust Funds and in the case of AMISOM direct support via assessed contributions. In 2008, the UN Secretary-General appointed a panel to look into options for funding AU-led peace support operations.  The Prodi panel recommended that UN assessed contributions should be used to fund AU peace support operations, if it is clear that the UN will take over such a mission in 6 months. This recommendation was not implemented, but on an ad hoc basis UN assessed contributions have been used to support part of the cost of AMISOM, and to prepare for the transition from the AU Support Mission in the Central African Republic (MISCA) to the UN Mission in the Central African Republic (MINUSCA).

 

Ambrosetti and Esmenjaud have identified four models for financing AU peace support operations:[12]

(1) when African states deploy with their own resources;

(2) when financial support is provided on a voluntary basis by non-African partners;

(3) when African-led operations are funded by the UN via the assessed contributions budget; and

(4) when African Troop contributing countries (TCCs) are given the institutional and financial cover of a formal UN-commanded peace operation.

 

Whilst all these models have their shortcomings, the AU has, in its Common African Position on the UN High Level Independent Panel on Peace Operations (HIPPO) and elsewhere, indicated that its preferred model for predictable and sustainable funding for AU-led peace support operations is to access UN assessed contributions.[13] The AU has consistently argued that its peace support operations are a global good undertaken on behalf of the UN Security Council that has the primary responsibility for maintaining international peace and security. Therefore, if the UN authorises the AU to undertake a peace support operation in the interest of maintaining international peace and security in lieu of the UN doing so itself, it should also provide the AU with the means to do so. This argument has gained support and was echoed by the 2015 UN high-level panel on peace operations,[14] the subsequent report by the UN Secretary-General and most recently by the joint AU-UN study on options for financing African peace operations.[15]

 

In response to the AU commitment to fund 25% of its own peace operations, the United States approached the AU in 2015 with a proposal to explore a standing UN commitment to support AU-led peace support operations authorised by the UN Security Council. Such support would come from the UN’s assessed contributions system and cover up to 75% of the costs of operations. Preconditions included that the AU contributes 25% of the costs, and puts in place the necessary financial and human rights due diligence policies and procedures so that it can comply with UN standards.

 

The AU responded to the proposal in the form of a Report of the Chairperson on the progress made with the implementation of the African Common Position on the High-Level Independent Panel on United Nations Peace Operations (HIPPO),[16] that spelled out the steps that the AU would take to deliver on its obligations, should such a standing commitment be made by the UN. This report was endorsed by the AU’s Peace and Security Council (PSC) that met at the level of Heads of State and Government in New York on 26 September 2015.

 

In the mean-time the AU and UN have continued to cooperate on a number of work streams aimed at strengthening their partnership, and in 2016 they undertook a joint study on funding options for financing AU peace support operations. The study found that:

 

“A division of labour has emerged in which the African Union has increasingly taken on tasks that the United Nations has not been able or willing to undertake. However, the African Union is not yet able to tackle these tasks alone. It is encouraging that the African Union continues to take steps towards financing a greater proportion of its own operations. But it is also critical that African peace support operations authorized by the United Nations Security Council have the support required to effectively address increasingly complex mandates in increasingly challenging environments.”[17]

 

In addition to the issue of a division of labour, the joint study made recommendations on the utilisation of the UN assessed contributions for AU PSOs; institutional reconfiguration of the AU and the UN; and the question around supporting counterinsurgency operations. These initiatives culminated in a UN Security Council debate and resolution 2320 in November 2016, that acknowledged and welcomed the AU’s commitment to self-finance 25% of its peace support operations by 2020, and that expressed the Council’s readiness “to consider the proposals of the AU for future authorization and support by the Security Council for AU peace support operations authorized by the Security Council”. The resolution asks the AU to update the Council in 6 months on the progress made with the implementation of its self-financing decisions.[18] The Council has subsequently debated the issue of UN support to AU peace support operations on several occasions, but have not yet made a standing commitment to support AU operations. Ambassador Nikki Hayley, the permanent representative of the United States, have explained that it is premature to make such a commitment until the AU have demonstrated that it is able to implement its own self-financing decisions.[19]

 

The AU has, from its inception, been dependent on its partners to fund its peace and security activities, including its peace support operations. Naturally, the AU’s partners will only fund those activities that are in their interests, and in an environment of continued economic austerity, will only fund those aspects of the AU’s operations they find essential. This has resulted in the AU developing an overly militarised peace support operations capacity and approach, with too little being invested in strategic analysis, prevention, mediation, political accompaniment and post-conflict reconstruction and development (PCRD). The decision taken at July 2016 Summit of the AU in Kigali on the financing of the AU and the AU Peace Fund may significantly alter these dynamics around the financing of AU peace support operations. In the next two sections I discuss these decisions and analyse their potential impact.

 

3. The July 2016 AU Financing Decisions

 

The AU has become reliant on partners for almost its entire peace and security expenditure. This situation is untenable and unsustainable and the AU has searched for a way out of this dependency for over 10 years.[20] One milestone in this search was the appointment of a high level panel led by former President Obasanjo of Nigeria that looked into alternative sources of financing the AU. Former President Obasanjo produced a report that suggested two innovative fundraising measures: a $10 levy on air travel and a $2 levy on hotel accommodations.  His report suggested these would raise over $700m a year for the AU.[21] The Obasanjo proposals were not implemented because those countries whose economies rely heavily on tourism argued that these levies would impact negatively on their tourism industries and that they would end-up carrying a disproportionate percentage of the burden of financing the AU.

 

In January 2016 the AU Chairperson appointed the former head of the African Development Bank, Dr. Donald Kaberuka, to be her Special Representative for the Peace Fund. He was tasked with developing a road map for the AU’s commitment to fund 25% of its peace and security activities. Dr. Kaberuka realised that any road map for funding the commitment of the AU to self-finance at least 25% of its peace and security budget cannot be divorced from the AU’s overall financial situation. As a result, he spearheaded an effort to find a solution to the overall funding situation of the AU.

 

The AU Summit in Kigali in June 2016 was devoted to the financial situation of the AU. It was preceded by a one-day head of State-level retreat on financing. At the retreat, Dr. Kaberuka and Dr. Carlos Lopez, at the time the Executive Director of the UN Economic Commission of Africa (ECA), proposed that the AU implement a 0.2% levy on imports from non-member states, and showed how such a tax will cover the assessed contributions of all member States of the Union.

 

Both the retreat and the subsequent Summit approved the import levy proposal, and a committee of ten Ministers of Finance, two from each region, was tasked to work out the modalities. The Summit decision specified that the amounts collected from the levy shall be paid into an account opened for the African Union with the Central bank of each member state. Member states shall transfer only the amount in the approved Scale of Assessment and shall retain the rest.[22] Based on import data, a 0.2% import levy would in 2017 generate approximately $1.2 billion. The AU budget for 2017 is approximately $700 million, so the import levy would cover the AU’s budget and generate a significant surplus.

 

In addition to the historic decision on the import levy, the July 2016 Summit also approved Dr. Kaberuka’s recommendations for the governance of the Peace Fund.[23] The Peace Fund was originally created by the OAU, but when the AU was established it was re-constituted through Article 21 of the Protocol establishing the Peace and Security Council. The Peace Fund was envisaged in the Protocol to be the primary vehicle for funding the AU’s peace and security operational activities.

 

The resources of the Peace Fund were to be made up from financial appropriations of the regular budget, voluntary contributions from Member States and other sources from within Africa, including the private sector, civil society and individuals, as well as through appropriate fund-raising activities. From its inception in 1993 until the July 2016 Summit decision, the Peace Fund received a set percentage from the AU regular budget as well as voluntary contributions. From 1993 until the 2008, the Peace Fund received 6% of the regular budget.[24] In order to increase funding to the Peace Fund the August 2009 Summit in Tripoli decided to gradually increase the percentage transferred to the Peace Fund from the regular budget from 6% to 12% by 2012. However, to date, this percentage has not yet been reached, and it currently stands at 7%.[25]

 

While some AU Member States have made additional voluntary contributions to the Peace Fund, these payments were irregular and unpredictable. As a result, Dr. Kaberuka found that the Fund is highly dependent on external partners.[26] He proposed that the Peace Fund should become the single peace and security activity account of the AU. That means that the peace and security activities currently covered in the programme and peace and security budgets be consolidated in the Peace Fund, and resourced via an annual assessment, which AU member states can pay via the 0.2% import levy.

 

Dr. Kaberuka proposed that the Peace Fund would be organised around three windows. The first should fund preventive diplomacy and mediation, the second institutional capacity and the third should fund peace support operations. In addition, he proposed the creation of a crisis reserve facility, which would be capitalized at a minimum of $30 million by 2020, and then be replenished as needed.[27]

 

Dr. Kaberuka proposed that the Peace Fund be politically directed by the Peace and Security Council and be managed by an executive management committee led by the Chairperson of the AU Commission. Oversight should be provided by a board of trustees. An independent evaluation group should periodically assess the functioning of the Peace Fund. A Secretariat for the Peace Fund should be established in the AU Commission, and an independent fund manager should be appointed to manage the financial aspects of the Fund.[28]

 

Dr. Kaberuka’s report also makes specific recommendations regarding partnerships, in particular the relationship with the UN. The report includes an annex with specific proposals for the consultative process that could be followed when UN support for AU peace support operations are being considered. Another important consideration is how to ensure compliance with international humanitarian and human rights law, and a further annex in the report makes specific recommendations for establishing an AU human rights and conduct and discipline compliance framework for AU peace support operations.[29]

 

The July 2016 decision on financing the AU via the 0.2% import levy and the governance of the Peace Fund, if fully implemented, will be the most important decision taken by AU member states since the inception of the AU. It has the potential to radically alter the situation of the AU from being dependent on partner funding to being able to self-finance its budget. In the last section I will consider the potential impact of these decisions.

 

 

4. Implications of the July 2016 Decisions on the Financing of the African Union and the Peace Fund

 

The largest credibility gap among partners (and within the AU) relate to whether AU member states will be able to collect and pass the funds generated by the import levy to the AU. The question one often hears is what has changed now, that will make member states that was unwilling to pay their contributions to the AU in the past, willing to do so now?

 

Whilst these are valid questions that only time can answer, there are several reasons why the July 2016 decisions have a high likelihood of being implemented. The first is that import figures are documented, and can be modelled. The expected income from imports are thus known and the income generated can be predicted within a reasonable range. This provides a very good basis for budgeting and planning. It also means that the AU’s budget can grow in relation to the economic prosperity of its member states, so there is a built-in correlation in the funding model between the size of the Commission and the prosperity of the continent.

 

The second is that such an import levy does not need any new institutions or mechanisms to be established. Existing customs institutions will be responsible for collecting the revenue, and existing central bank institutions will be responsible for transferring the funds to the AU. The import levy can also be used to develop and strengthen national customs capacity, where needed. Additional modalities, such as an AU account with the central bank of each member state that has the AU as a co-signatory can further enhance transparency. However, AU member states will have to adopt national decisions to implement the levy, and in some cases these may need legislation to be passed. The AU has given member states a year to introduce such decisions and the levy is due to become operational by 1 January 2018.

 

Thirdly, there are existing precedents that the AU and its member states can learn from. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) has successfully introduced a community levy that is 0.5% of customs and excise duties, and this has helped ECOWAS to self-finance a portion of its budget. For instance, ECOWAS largely self-financed its mission to Guinea-Bissau, which consisted of approximately 60 Security Sector Reform advisors. The Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) has also tried a similar community levy with less success, and one of the lessons from the ECCAS’ experience is that the AU will have to strengthen its sanctions regime to dissuade some countries from defaulting on their payments.

 

The fourth, and this aspect of the July decision was confirmed by the Committee of Finance Ministers in August 2017, is that the difference between the amount collected as a result of the 0.2% levy and the assessed contributions that each Member State have to contribute to the AU Commission may be utilised by the Member State for its own purposes. This will be an added incentive to Member States.

 

These four aspects of the 0.2% levy proposal made in 2016 increase the chances that it may be fully implemented. Two other aspects related to the 0.2% import levy need to be resolved in the coming months. One question is whether the decision needs to be implemented by all member states? Can some opt out and continue to pay their assessed contributions from their treasuries? Another question is whether imposing import duties on non-AU member states are compatible with Word Trade Organizations rules and obligations. Such issues need further consideration and will need to be addressed over the coming months.

 

Others who support the decision also raise concerns about the AUC’s competence to efficiently manage the funds that will flow through the Peace Fund. The EU, for instance, is said to be apprehensive about the level of bureaucracy and red tape related to procurement. The AUC will have to significantly improve the efficiency of the AU’s financial systems, especially when it comes to peace and security activities, both by implementing the new governance structures suggested by Dr. Kaberuka, as well as improving the policies and rules for managing the expenditures relate to the AU’s peace and security activities. For instance, most procurement is done via the AU Commission in Addis. Greater authority will have to be delegated to the field for procurement and other expenses, but that needs to be accompanied by the systems and staff to manage such responsibility professionally and with due oversight. The AU has recently developed a new procurement manual that should further improve its efficiency in this regard.

 

Some AU member states, especially those who contribute the largest portion of the AU budget – Algeria, Angola, Egypt, Morocco, Nigeria and South Africa contribute 60% of the total budget – have signalled that AU member states should be represented in the management and oversight bodies of the Peace Fund, in order to give member states the confidence that they will be able to monitor and direct the expenditure of the Peace Fund.

 

These concerns and uncertainties need to be addressed, but none are insurmountable. If fully implemented these decisions will have a significant impact on the independence and agency of the AU, and the effectiveness of its peace and security activities. It is also likely to substantially change the relationship between the AU and its partners, and have implications for the ownership and responsibility of the AU’s member states towards the functioning of the AU Commission.

 

The income from the import levy will at a minimum generate sufficient resources to fully fund the AU’s regular budget and 75% of its programme budget. The funding generated by the import levy may enable the AU to shift its relations with partners away from one defined by financial necessity, to one informed by strategic choice. The AU will have more leeway to decide on whether it is in its interest to enter into a partnership, and will have greater leverage to decide the terms of this partnership. This is likely to significantly change the AU’s relationship with partners, away from a donor-like relationship dominated by a capacity building and institutional development narrative, and towards a strategic partnership.

 

On peace and security activities the import levy should generate sufficient funds for the AUC to manage its own prevention and mediation activities, including funding its own special political missions and liaison offices. It should also enable the AU to fund its own institutional capacity needs and to capitalise its own critical reserve facility.  At the same time, it may opt to welcome some partner contributions, but this will be based on strategic considerations, rather than financial need. The import levy generates the resources, and the Peace Fund provides the mechanism, through which the AU can have a single peace and security account. This provides the AU with the independent agency to decide how much resources it wishes to direct towards prevention, mediation and post-conflict reconstruction and development (PCRD), as opposed to spending a disproportionate amount of its resources on costly and overly securitised peace support operations.

 

On peace support operations the AU is committed to fund at least 25% of its operations. The import levy may enable it to increase that percentage when it is in its strategic interest to do so. For instance, in some cases it may be in the AU’s interest to fully fund an operation on its own. By limiting its contribution to 25% for AU-led operations that have been mandated by the UN, the AU wants to maintain the principle that the international community should share the burden of the cost of maintaining international peace and security.

 

One of the most important changes that are likely to come about relates to the relationship between the AU Commission and its member states. Given that the AU Commission is funded almost 99% by partners, member states have had little financial leverage over their own Commission. This led to a certain distance between the Commission and member states, and a sense of loss of African ownership over its own peace and security agenda. However, when the Commission is funded by its member states they will have greater leverage and ownership, and take more responsibility for the effective and efficient functioning of their Commission. This will be the case especially for peace support operations where AU member states are likely to become much more interested in the scope, duration, impact and exit strategies of the AU’s missions.  This is a positive and much needed development that will result in AU member states being much more results driven in their oversight of the AU Commission.

 

Lastly, if the AU fails to implement the 2016 import levy decision it will seriously undermine the credibility of the AU and call into question the commitment of African states to the Union. Considerable expectations have been raised, both among its member states and with partners, and it will be difficult to regain credibility for such proposals and reforms in future if this initiative fails.

 

 

5. Conclusion

 

To date, the AU has had to rely on its partners to finance the bulk of its peace and security activities. Whilst considerable capacity has been developed over the last decade, the understandable reality is that the partners have funded the AU to act in their own interest. In most cases the interest of the AU and its partner converge. However, there are some cases where the AU should have the means to act independently and in its own interests.

 

Partners will naturally only use their own scarce resources for what is in their direct interest, and for the AU this meant that partners have at times invested in the minimum necessary to manage a conflict, but not enough to resolve it. This has resulted in the AU developing an overly militarised peace support operations capacity and approach, with too little being invested in strategic analysis, prevention, mediation, political accompaniment and post-conflict reconstruction and development (PCRD).

 

The July 2016 AU Summit decisions on financing the AU Commission with the imposition of a 0.2% levy on imports and the establishment of new governance mechanisms for the Peace Fund will, if full implemented, significantly change the AU’s means, which in turn should have important implications for its independence, agency and effectiveness.

 

If the AU develops the means to self-finance the Commission, including a minimum of 25% of its peace support operations, it will be in a much stronger position to develop strategic partnerships with the UN, EU and bilateral partners. The AU member states are also likely to take much greater responsibility for, and ownership of, the functioning of the Commission and its operations.

 

If the AU fails to implement the 2016 import levy decision it will seriously undermine the credibility of the AU. Considerable expectations have been raised, both among its member states and with partners, and it will be difficult to regain credibility for such proposals and reforms in future if this initiative fails.

 

The July 2016 decisions on the financing of the African Union may thus prove to be a critical decision point in the journey towards a more mature African Union. It is likely to result in a much stronger African Union, and if so, the AU will play an even more meaningful role in the emerging global peace and security architecture.

 

 

Bibliography

 

African Union, 2014, Progress Report of the High Level Panel on Alternative Sources of Financing the African Union, SC7749 (Addis Ababa: African Union).

 

African Union, 2015, Common African Position on the UN High Level Independent Panel on Peace Operations (Addis Ababa: African Union).

 

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[1] Cedric de Coning is a Senior Research Fellow with ACCORD and the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI). In 2016 he served as an advisor to the Special Representative of the Chairperson of the AU Commission for the Peace Fund, Dr. Donald Kaberuka. This chapter is written in his personal capacity and does not reflect the views of the Special Representative nor the African Union Commission. The author is grateful to John Karlsrud, Natasja Rupesingha, Jide M. Okeke, Elling N. Tjønneland, Faten Aggad and Luckystar Miyandazi for their valuable comments.

[2] African Union, 2016, Securing Predictable and Sustainable Financing for Peace and Security in Africa (Addis Ababa: African Union), p.3.

[3] de Coning, C. 1997, ‘The Role of the OAU in Conflict Management in Africa, Conflict Management, Peacekeeping and Peace-Building’, in Lessons for Africa from a Seminar Past, ISS Monograph Series, No. 10.

[4] Engel, U. & Gomes Porto, J.  2013 Towards an African Peace and Security Regime: Continental Embeddedness, Transnational Linkages, Strategic Relevance (Surrey, Ashgate), p. 66.

[5] Ismail, O. & Sköns, E. 2014, E. Security Activities of External Actors in Africa (Oxford, Oxford University Press), p. 176.

[6] Brosig, M. 2015 Cooperative Peacekeeping in Africa: Exploring regime complexity (London, Routledge), P. 250.

[7] Lotze, W. (2013). Strengthening African Peace Support Operations: Nine lessons for the future of the African Standby Force. ZIF Policy Briefing (Berlin: ZIF – Center for International Peace Operations). By November 2016, the total contribution  (incl. police) from AU member states to UN peace operations has increased to 49227, see: http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/resources/statistics/contributors.shtml.

[8] Securing Predictable and Sustainable Financing for Peace and Security in Africa, African Union, August 2016, p. 3.

[9] Brosig, 2015, p. 249.

[10] Badmus, I.A. 2015. The African Union’s Role in Peacekeeping: Building on Lessons Learned from Security Operations (London, Palgrave MacMillan), p. 101.

[11] African Peace Facility Report 2015, available at: http://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/sites/devco/files/apf-report-2015-en.pdf

[12] Ambrosetti, D. & Esmenjaud, R. 2014 “Whose money funds African peace operations?: negotiating influence and autonomy with external partners”, in Tardy, T. & Wyss, M. Peacekeeping in Africa: The Evolving Security Architecture (London, Routledge), p. 73.

[13] African Union, Common African Position on the UN High Level Independent Panel on Peace Operations (Addis Ababa: African Union)

[14] United Nations, 2015, Uniting Our Strenghts for Peace: Politics, Partnership and  People, Report of the High Level Independent Panel on Peace Operations (New York: United Nations), para 232.

[15] United Nations, 2016, Report of the joint African Union–United Nations review of available mechanisms to

finance and support African Union peace support operations authorized by the United

Nations Security Council (New York: United Nations), p. 33-34.

[16] African Union, Report of the Chairperson on progress on implementing the AU Common Position on the High Level Independent Panel on Peace Operations (Addis Ababa: African Union).

[17] United Nations, 2016, p. 33-34.

[18] United Nations Security Council Resolution 2320 (2016) adopted at its 7816th meeting, on 18 November 2016.

[19] AU-UN Cooperation, UN Security Council Monthly Forecast July 2017, posted on 30 June 2017, available on http://www.securitycouncilreport.org/monthly-forecast/2017-07/au-un_cooperation.php, accessed on 15 August 2017.

[20] The AU Audit Report of 2007 noted that: “A number of these studies have made practical suggestions, including a Union Community Levy, Value Added Tax and taxes on air travel. For instance, a study carried out by the AU Commission indicates that a levy at a rate of 0.5 percent on 88 percent of cif value of imports from third countries would have generated as much as US$600 million in 2002. This is ten times the current budget of the AU. Similarly another recent study by the AU based on air passenger surveys on air travel to and from Africa, shows the high potential of such a source. Collection of revenue from this source will not require complex administrative machinery.” Similar proposals was thus being floated among AU Member States since as early as 2007.

[21] African Union, 2014, Progress Report of the High Level Panel on Alternative Sources of Financing the African Union, SC7749 (Addis Ababa: African Union), available At: http://ccpau.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/obasanjo-panel-progress-report-assembly-au-18-xix-2012-_e.pdf).

[22] See Assembly decision: Assembly/AU/Dec.605 (XXVII) para 5b, of July 2016.

[23] Ibid.

[24] Badmus, 2015, p. 100).

[25] African Union, 2016, Securing Predictable and Sustainable Financing for Peace and Security in Africa (Addis Ababa: African Union), p. 3.

[26] Ibid, p.4

[27] Ibid, p.7

[28] Ibid, p.9

[29] Ibid, p.10