Running for two days, the government seminar on the theme “Acceleration of transformation” ended on January 19, with the promotion by the Prime Minister of a three-axis strategy, capable of driving change and the development of the national economy.
Catching up on the delay in the transformation of Gabon, during the last 12 years of President Ali Bongo’s double seven-year term, such is the challenge that Rose Christiane Ossouka Raponda and her team will have to take up; for the next 24 months, despite the negative impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the national economy.
“We must make up for this delay in a context of budgetary restrictions, which obliges us to be innovative in the methods of mobilizing financing for our investments, by giving priority to private investments and public-private partnerships, the risks of which we must, however, control” a declared Rose Christiane Ossouka Raponda.
For the Prime Minister, after forty-eight hours of discussion and reflection on the advisability of drawing a visible horizon, for the country, for the next two years; a plan to accelerate the transformation on three realistic priority axes seems to be the solution.
This is structured around 12 strategic orientations, themselves broken down into 32 priority action programs, materialized by concrete and operational measures. It is supposed to help create the conditions for more vigorous, inclusive and sustainable growth; to speed up the process of independence from international prices for certain commodities and to wring the jobless’ neck by creating jobs.
The “economic” base constitutes the first axis of the 2021-2023 strategic plan for the acceleration of the transformation. It focuses on the forest-wood sector and agriculture, identified as priority sectors. The second base, “growth catalyst”, is supposed to review the investment policy in major works (roads, water and electricity works). The last axis, the “social” base, consists in strengthening the efficiency of public services, in particular the employability and empowerment of young people.
For the President of the Republic, the resolutions of the government seminar should not remain a dead letter. They will have to be carried out in full and in reality. “The purpose of this project is not to come up with proposals to feed an umpteenth report on Gabon’s development strategy which will be put in a closet,” he said.
