Impact

Support to Policy Development and Security Sector Reform/Governance (SSR/G) Implementation

Support to the African Union and RECs

The ASSN provided technical support to the African Union Commission in the drafting of the African Union Security Sector Reform Policy Framework (AU-SSRPF) which was adopted by the Assembly of the Union in January 2013. As part of the background to this project, the ASSN:

  • Established an independently funded advisory office at the African Union Commission headquarters in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, headed by a Senior SSR Advisor and consisting of a Gender and SSR Officer and two research assistants.
  • Held a major workshop on an ‘African SSR Strategy’ at the African Union Commission in Addis Ababa in October 2007, resulting in extensive recommendations to the African Union on SSR.
  • Provided background facilitation to the United Nations-African Union Regional SSR Consultations in Addis Ababa (22-25 March 2009), sourcing Canadian funding through the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT), for the event and providing experts for the workshop.
  • Delivered a number of Policy Briefs to support the African Union SSR Policy process under contract to the African Union; anchored an SSR Validation Workshop at the African Union on 9-11 December 2009.
  • Conducted a review (collaboratively with the United Nations SSR Team of the Zero Draft of the African Union SSR Policy Framework) in Addis Ababa in May 2010; and funded a workshop in Ghana in October 2010 to finalise the policy draft.
  • Anchored the ‘Civil Society Consultations’ on the African Union SSR Policy draft in Abuja in November 2010 and supported the ‘African Union Member States Experts Meeting’ on the same draft in Addis Ababa in May 2011.

Several ASSN experts were subsequently deployed to harmonise the main African Union language versions (English, French, Portuguese and Arabic) of the final draft of the African Union SSR Policy Framework (AUSSR-PF) in Addis Ababa (February – March 2012), prior to its adoption by the Assembly on the Union in January 2013;

The adoption of the AU-SSRPF was followed by the launch in May 2013 of the multiyear programme ‘Building African Union Capacities for Security Sector Reform (SSR): a Joint United Nations/European Union Support Action’, under which ASSN was a technical partner. Under a funding agreement with the United Nations Office of Project Services (UNOPS), ASSN was tasked with developing the seven (7) Operational Guidance Notes (OGNs) for the implementation of the AUSSR-PF, viz:

  1. African Union Guidance on Developing National Codes of Conduct for African Security Institutions.
  2. Handbook on SSR Lessons Learned and Good Practices.
  3. Operational Guidance Notes on Harmonisation of National Security Legislation.
  4. Operational Guidance Notes on SSR Needs Assessments Missions.
  5. Operational Guidance Notes on Gender and SSR.
  6. Manual on SSR Training.
  7. SSR Monitoring and Evaluation Template.

The ASSN network currently participates in Joint Assessment Missions with the programme partners: four such missions have been conducted so far (Central African Republic, Madagascar, Guinea Bissau and Mali).

The ASSN also worked with the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) in 2009 on the first phase of the Security Sector Governance (SSG) component of the ECOWAS Conflict Prevention Strategy (ECPS), with funding from the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit GmbH (GIZ), and with the Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF) in the development of the ECOWAS-DCAF ‘Guide to Parliamentary Oversight of the Security Sector’, and more recently, a ‘Toolkit for Security Sector Reform and Governance’ for use by ECOWAS.