APS : Tuesday, 10 January 2017
ALGIERS-The General Inspection of Finance (IGF) and the Spanish institute of tax studies have officially launched Tuesday an institutional twinning under the Support to the Association Agreement Programme (SAAP/P3A), during a seminar held at the National School of Administration (ENA).
Supervised by the Management Unit of the P3A and financed to the tune of €1.4 million by the EU, this twenty-four twining includes 69 exchange missions and training to 150 employees of the IGF.
“This twinning allows the IGF to receive a valuable support to take new steps in its modernization efforts,” stressed Finance Minister Hadji Babaaammi at the launching ceremony
The minister, who highlighted the importance of this partnership that reflects cooperation between Algeria and the EU, stated “this twining is a supplementary asset in the consolidation and development of economic ties between Algeria and Spain.”
“We expect a genuine contribution of the Spanish experience to strengthening IGF’s institutional, organizational and professional capacities to better meet the requirements of good governance of public finance,” he said.
Following this twining, the IGF should focus its interventions on the main risks previously identified and upgrade the level of expertise of its operational staff in the fields of monitoring, assessment of major projects and public policies, added Babaammi.
For his part, the Director General of the IGF Ali Terrak said this twining, coupled with the technical assistance being finalized with the African Development Bank (AfDB), “will surely give a new dimension to this institution and will allow it achieve a qualitative leap in methodology, preparation, implementation, restitution and follow-up of it missions.”
IGF should be transformed into Advisory and decision support tool
For Terrak, the IGF should “involve itself and anticipate reforms in other areas while engaging in a progressive transformation into a tool of proposal, advice and decision-making.
Director of cooperation with the EU and international institutions at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Ali Mokrani emphasized the importance attached by Algerian authorities to this twining operation that represents “an excellent tool of transfer of expertise and good practices.”
“We welcome IGF twinning with an institution belonging to a member-state of the EU, with which Algeria has excellent and deep relations,” he argued.
The official launching ceremony of this twining project was attended by the Minister for Digital Economy and Modernization of Financial Systems, Mouatassem Boudiaf, ambassadors of the EU and Spain to Algeria and executives of Algerian and Spanish
For the head of the EU delegation John O’Rourke, Algeria is the country “that uses this twinning tool the most.”
“I think that Algerian administration have well understood the advantages of such cooperation,” he added.
For his part, Spain’s ambassador to Algeria Alejandro Polanco Mata said that this twining “is a source of great satisfaction for the Spanish administration.”
