Scoop: EU halts funding as OACPS woes ‘more serious than expected’

The European Commission has suspended payments to the 79-member Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States, or OACPS, citing management problems, “questionable” leadership decisions, and the need to recover “ineligible expenses” charged to European taxpayers. In a letter dated Jan. 27, Koen Doens, the director-general of the commission’s development department, wrote that the preliminary results of recent audits into OACPS, initiated by the commission, left it no choice “but to suspend all payments to the Secretariat in order to protect the financial interests of the European Union.” It could sound the death knell for the group, which was once the main interlocutor between European nations and their former colonies on topics like trade and foreign aid. While maintaining a staff of around 50 people, mostly in Brussels, OACPS’ influence has waned in recent years, with French President Emmanuel Macron among those to question the value added by the group. Despite the doubters, the commission pushed through a fresh 20-year EU-OACPS partnership agreement in November 2023, arguing at the time that the deal would “provide a platform for dialogue and coordination to face the challenges of our times together.” The agreement included a commitment from the commission to keep contributing to the costs of joint meetings between European officials and their counterparts from ACP states, as well as some of the OACPS secretariat’s operating costs. The commission previously told Devex that it spent €36.5 million on the group between 2013 and 2023, with €46.7 million budgeted for the 2021-2027 period. But now it seems the commission has run out of patience. Tellingly, unlike a previous warning from Doens in March 2024 addressed to Georges Chikoti, the OACPS secretary-general, the January letter, seen by Devex, was addressed to Léon Mokoko, ambassador of the Republic of Congo to Belgium and the EU, and at the time, the president of the OACPS Committee of Ambassadors — the committee supposed to oversee the work of the secretariat on behalf of OACPS states. At the end of January, the presidency of the committee passed to Eswatini’s EU ambassador, Sibusisiwe Mngomezulu. Meanwhile, Chikoti’s five-year term as OACPS secretary-general is about to end, though his successor is yet to be selected and a December meeting of OACPS ministers on the topic failed to make progress. OACPS has depended on European funding throughout its 50-year history, though its financial woes have deepened of late with many states still behind on their membership dues, adding to the departure of key member, South Africa, and a failed attempt to renovate its Brussels headquarters at a cost of over €6 million to European taxpayers. That has triggered increasing alarm from the commission, which spent €271,500 last year to insert two external consultants into the OACPS secretariat’s finance department. Internal OACPS documents, seen by Devex, showed that the secretariat has been under pressure for years from its own Committee of Ambassadors and the commission to produce realistic budgets, lower staff costs, and provide transparency on its true financial position. In March 2024, Doens wrote to Chikoti, noting that since 2020, the commission has been trying to recover €5.6 million given to the OACPS, including “undue borrowing of about EUR 4 million from the EU prefinancing of the operating grant and then in the submission of non-eligible expenditures.” As of March 2024, the commission was still trying to recover €3.6 million. Last year, the commission also told the OACPS that it would stop prefinancing its activities. Instead, Doens told Chikoti that the commission would only provide reimbursements for activities once they were completed and accompanied by audited financial reports. According to a document obtained by Devex, Chikoti told ambassadors last year that “the Secretariat’s financial situation continues to be dire and the EU’s refusal to pre-finance activities could further intensify the crisis.” Chikoti then “indicated efforts by the Secretariat to call on countries to consider paying their contributions in advance, but remained concerned that if no favourable response was received, the Secretariat would not be able to pay salaries after June 2024.” OACPS spokesperson Sousa Jamba did not respond to a question on whether the organization was currently paying its staff’s salaries. “We share your concerns regarding the critical financial situation of the Secretariat,” Doens wrote to Mokoko in his letter last month, adding that the results of the commission audits “show a situation more serious than expected.” “If the late payments of member states contribute to certain difficulties, the management problems of the Secretariat and the questionable decisions taken by senior management since 2020 are even more worrying,” Doens wrote, in French. “This has led to ineligible expenses from the support of the European Union, which will oblige us to send recovery requests in the coming weeks.” A commission spokesperson told Devex earlier this month: “We do not comment on leaked letters. We can confirm the audit is ongoing, but as it is not yet finalised, we cannot comment on the outcome.” Addressing the audits referred to in Doens’ letter, Jamba told Devex by email on Feb. 5 that “the OACPS Secretariat and its governing bodies are reviewing this important matter and fully engaging with the European Commission to address all concerns quickly and comprehensively.” “Given that only an initial audit report has been tabled, we await the submission of a final version before completing our consideration,” the OACPS spokesperson wrote. “In light of these circumstances, it remains imperative that no definitive conclusions be drawn. The OACPS remains committed to strengthening its partnership with the European Union and is therefore deeply engaged with our longstanding partner through open communication and frank dialogue.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​”