Benin report - Institut Africain de la Gouvernance

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY__________________________________________________________________________appropriate measures to effectively combat any kind of exploitation, especiallyeconomic and sexual exploitation and child trafficking.3.2 Economic governance and management3.18 Stakes and challenges of governance and economic management. Benin‟spostcolonial economic history can be divided into three major periods.Economic governance and management policies have followed these threeperiods, and have influenced both the focus and challenges of the country‟seconomic structure throughout its history.3.19 The first period (1960-1972) was marked by great instability, with a series ofcoups d‟état and frequent change of leaders (more than 15 heads of state) andpolitical regimes. Benin was known as the „sick child‟ of West Africa and thepolitical management of independence was constantly in crisis. The coupd‟état of October 1972 put an end to this period. The focus and challenge oftransforming an economic structure based on colonial objectives into anintegrated economic structure aimed at national development were not takeninto account during this period.3.20 The second period (1972-1990), that of the construction of socialism, wasmarked by nationalisation of some private enterprises and by the creation ofnew state enterprises and semipublic companies. Economic policy in thesocialist development system, which mainly advocated industrialisation,encouraged massive state industrial investment for which the country mayhave lacked the necessary management capacity. This resulted in a seriouseconomic crisis.3.21 The third period (1990 to date), known as the Democratic New Deal, beganafter the National Sovereign Conference. The return to liberalism and theestablishment of a multiparty democracy formed the basis of economicmanagement. Whilst now receiving international aid, the country‟s economicgovernance in this period was marked by a need for macroeconomicstabilisation in order to create the conditions necessary for economic recovery.The macroeconomic results were satisfactory, but development and structuralchange prompted a quest for financial balance, which replaced developmentpolicy. The economic governance model could not last long and the countrybecame increasingly incapable of effectively playing its role as a transiteconomy and, especially, of reducing poverty.3.22 The country has defined its long-term vision in the Alafia Bénin 2025 project,and this is a praiseworthy step. The Alafia Bénin 2025 vision seeks to build anemerging Benin by that year. Furthermore, the government recently translatedthe vision into „strategic development orientations‟. However, the coordinationneeded to implement these orientations, and particularly translating them intosectoral policies, suffers from certain weaknesses that breed other challengesfor economic governance. These weaknesses are widespread corruption(which has become a culture and a more or less internalisedmethod/instrument of governance) and lack of accountability in the11