Debbie

Cutbacks

Recommendations come alive

Pacific Island government delegates

have now put away the relevant documents and ended their discus sions on the programmes of the South Pacific Commission (SPC) - for the next six or so months at least.

Yes, yet another meeting of the SPC’s Committee of Representatives of Governments and Administrations (CRGA) has passed and, being the end of year, so has another South Pacific Conference.

To background things and unravel any confusion one may have after reading the above paragraph - the SPC holds two CRGA meetings each year - in May and around October/November.

The second CRGA meeting is followed by the SPC conference which usually runs for the final two days following the three day CRGA.

This year’s meetings were hosted by Saipan, Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), and those “priv ileged” enough to attend (depending on whether or not one would feel privileged to work 15 hours a day while resisting the temptation to throw themselves of Saipan’s “Suicide Cliff’) reported only praise for the logistics of the conference and the hospitality of the host country.

In fact, things were so well organised that SPC’s chief editor who felt poorly on opening day opened her hotel room door to police officers and the fire brigade at 7am when she reported her state of health to the local organising committee.

And the close attention to detail did not stop there. After gently sending the police and fire people on their way, chief editor found herself attending to yet another knock on her door.

This time it was a group of uniformed ambulance personnel who thought she

needed their services because they assumed she was having a heart attack.

Again, not so. The diligent staff member was only having a small bout of influenza - nonetheless, one can only marvel at the Saipanese attention to detail.

And so to the business at hand. This year’s annual CRGA and conference debated, among administrative and fund ing matters, the 33 recommendations fol lowing a review of the Commission con ducted by a three-member team led by Savenaca Siwatibau of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific’s (ESCAP) Pacific Operations Centre in Vanuatu.

SPC Director of Services Lourdes Pangelinan (now deputy Director-General following endorsement of the title change by the conference) said the conference basically endorsed through consensus most of the review’s major recommenda tions, placing reservations on only a few.

Among the recommendations were downsizing the SPC from the top through: • reducing the organisation’s three management posts to two;

• changing the Secretary-General’s

and his/her deputies’ titles to Director- General and deputy Director-Generals; • allowing the conference to appoint the Director-General based on strict selection criteria; • giving the Director-General full responsibility and authority to manage the organisation and be totally account able for any failure to meet the organi

sation’s objectives;

• staging one CRGA meeting each year with the conference taking place every two years, as opposed to its cur rent annual basis; • introducing a two-term limitation for the posts of Secretary-General and

Debbie

Singh

The Spc

his/her deputy ; and • changing the name of the organisa tion to better reflect its purpose and the

geographic representation of the

region.

Of the latter, it was suggested a com petition be run among secondary schools to decide on a new name for the organisa tion.

It was also decided that the name change take effect from 1998, a year after the organisation celebrates its golden

jubilee.

The conference agreed future SPC conferences would be held every two years beginning in 1998 to appoint the Director-General whose contract, together with his/her deputy, would comprise two terms.

French Polynesia, New Caledonia, Tokelau, Tuvalu and Pitcairn endorsed the review recommendations.

Pitcairn supported but expressed a reservation on recommendation 33 which called for a change in the organisation’s name.

Wallis and Futuna and the Federated States of Micronesia expressed reserva tions on some of the recommendations but urged the conference to adopt the review’s recommendations.

The FSM delegate said while he sup ported the idea of change, it should not come simply for the sake of change.

The United States of America said while some delegations had expressed reservations on parts of the review recom mendations, the time had come to move forward to reflect a new and improved SPC that was embracing change and pre pared to do more with less.

Governments such as the Cook Islands, American Samoa, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Western Samoa and Tonga felt they needed more time to consider the review report.

The Vanuatu representative said while it was still early to make an objective assessment of the new management team, he welcomed their innovative ideas and new bottom-up approach; their commit ment and efforts to reducing administra tive costs and their willingness to improve SPC’s relationship with its traditional donor partners and create an environment conducive to attracting and convincing

new development partners.

The delegate also urged the manage ment team to further strengthen its con sultation with Island member govern ments and administrations.

He also stressed the need for the Commission to continue to observe the

principles of cost-efficiency, transparency

and accountability in programme manage ment.

On the issue of funding, the United States said it could not endorse the Commission’s proposed 1997 budget due to its current fiscal predicament and fol lowing a reduction in the US budget allo cation by SUSBS million for 48 interna

tional organisations.

He stated, however, that he would continue to plead the SPC case in Washington and said the US would attempt to meet its 1997 assessed contri bution in full.

Representatives of the smaller Island countries promised to honour their debts before the end of 1996 while the Tuvalu representative expressed his govern ment’s concern at the status of assessed contributions and the substantial amount still owed to the SPC.

The representative said Tuvalu was finding it extremely difficult to meet its financial commitments using the current formula for assessed contributions.

The May 1997 CRGA meeting has thus been asked to consider a new formu la for assessed contributions based on members’ capacity to pay.

Of the review, Director-General Bob Dun told the conference; “Time was of the essence.

“The recommendations for long-term change were required by September 1996 if meaning was to be given to manage ment’s three-year programme.”

“The review has been carried out quite brilliantly ... the opportunity has been cre ated for substantial long-term improve ment in the way SPC will manage its ser vice role for the Pacific region - going into its second 50 years.”

“I must thank all SPC staff and my col leagues who have had to learn very rapid ly to swim in a sea of change.

“This is not easy ... but they’ve done it well. And who knows - 1997 may be the year they get to like it!” ■