UNDP supports good governance with US $2.6 m

Togo will get US $2.6 million from the United Nations Development Programme to restore its administrative capability and rebuild relations with the international community, UNDP reported on Thursday. Under the three-year project UNDP will rehabilitate the national statistical office, shore up the national audit office to improve oversight and, it said, "strengthen management of economic and social development programmes".

The initiative also aims to reduce Togo's international isolation by re-establishing relations with major development partners such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. The UNDP says this could be achieved by rehabilitating government departments directly involved in development policies, planning and macro-economic management.

Additional measures, UNDP said, required government's presence at all local levels, oversight of public finance and the creation of a poverty and sustainable human development observatory. The package will also support the first national census since 1981. Togo ranks 145th on the UNDP Human Development Index. Most budgetary and development aid for institutional support for the government was suspended in 1993 because of a charged political environment.