THE West African Institute for Financial and Economic Management, WAIFEM, in collaboration with Centre for Financial Journalism, CFJ, Nigeria is organising a workshop on budget monitoring and reporting for financial analysts and journalists. The five-day workshop is scheduled from July 17 to 21, at the Central Bank of Nigeria’s International Training Institute, ITI, Abuja and is funded by the African Capacity Building Foundation, ACBF, and WAIFEM.

The workshop will draw participants from West African countries, including Nigeria, Ghana, Liberia, Sierra Leone, The Gambia, Senegal, Ivory Coast, Togo, Benin Republic, Niger, Guinea, Burkina Faso, Mali and Guinea Bissau. The participants will come from the Central Banks and Ministry of Finance of the various West African countries, the West African Monetary Institute, WAMI, West African Monetary Agency, WAMA, BCEAO, ECOWAS  and media houses (Television, Radio, Newspapers and Online publications) in the west coast.

According to a statement issued in Lagos by WAIFEM and CFJ Nigeria, the objective of the workshop is to sharpen the skills of financial analysts in public institutions and the fourth estate of the realm in budget tracking, monitoring and reporting. This, the organisations said, is to enable them to track, monitor and report the annual budgets of national and sub-nationals to ensure accountability and transparency in all phases of the budget process since these are prerequisites for effective and efficient service delivery and inclusive government.

Economists and financial experts have been lined up to facilitate at the workshop. They include Professor Akpan H. Ekpo, director general of West African Institute for Financial and Economic Management;  Professor Douglason G. Omotor, Advisor, Business Development and Consultancy Unit of WAIFEM; Biodun Adedipe, chief consultant, B. Adedipe Associates,  Ogho Okiti,, President/CEO, Time Economics,  and Ray Echebiri, chief executive of Centre for Financial Journalism.

—  Jul 12, 2017 @ 14:00 GMT