On the occasion of the handing over of this year’s German Africa Award to the Mayor of Freetown, Yvonne Aki-Sawyyer, Rebecca Schamber (SPD), Member of the German Bundestag, together with the German Africa Foundation and the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, organised an expert discussion in the German Bundestag on 15 October.
From left to right: Dr Lena Gutheil, Yvonne Aki-Sawyyer, Sabine Odhiambo, Dr Heike Litzinger
©IDOS
The discussion revolved around different approaches for sustainable and inclusive urban planning in Africa, based on Aki-Sawyyers experiences with her ambitious urban agenda “Transform Freetown – Transforming Lives”. The agenda includes four priority sectors (resilience, human development, healthy cities, urban mobility), which are aligned with the SDGs and was co-created with the citizens of Freetown. In her first term, Aki-Sawyyer successfully installed Freetown’s first waste water treatment plant, improved the water situation in the city by setting up water kiosks and planted 1.2 million trees to fight soil erosion.
Given the importance of public participation in Aki-Sawyyers governance approach, Dr Lena Gutheil (IDOS) discussed the current state of participatory urban governance in Africa. Public participation can contribute to more targeted and effective allocation of resources and might also foster the state’s accountability towards its citizens at the municipal level. Engaging citizens in urban governance can thereby strengthen citizens’ trust in institutions and contribute to increase the legitimacy of democratic processes and actors. In order for these democratic benefits to materialise in practice, public participation needs to be institutionalised and should be carried out in an inclusive and transparent manner. All too often, public participation is dominated by elites and a lack of financing and legislation prevents public participation from living up to its full potential.
The German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) was represented by Dr Heike Litzinger, head of the division for Energy, Urban Development and Mobility. Dr Litzinger emphasised the importance of increasing cities’ finances in order for them to be able to tackle problems such as fighting the impact of climate change. The annual financing gap for African cities is estimated at 150 Billion US-Dollars. BMZ supports cities, amongst others, in fiscal decentralisation matters and the development of bankable projects for investments in sustainable infrastructure.
IDOS congratulates Yvonne Aki-Sawyyer on being awarded the German Africa Award 2024 and sends best wishes for the further development of Freetown.
