Asian Liberals call for greater transparency in ODA

(April 28, 2006/ Siem Reap, Cambodia) The Council of Asian Liberals & Democrats (CALD) called for greater transparency and mutual accountability of official development during the international conference on Public Accountability in ODA which ends tomorrow.

The conference participants, mostly coming from liberal and democratic political parties in Asia and members of parliament in various ASEAN countries, cited the need to exercise increased oversight, and greater participation in decision making regarding ODAs.

In particular, the right to information was cited as an absolute necessity in ensuring transparency and greater accountability. It was cited it was duty of governments provide access to information upon request by its citizenry. The strengthening of media, civil society and political parties as strong democratic institutions was also recommended.

Many of the participants acknowledged that a significant percentage of ODAs do not reach the intended beneficiaries because of corruption.

This conference, hosted by the Sam Rainsy Party of Cambodia and supported by the German liberal foundation, Friedrich Naumann Stiftung, is aimed at identifying best practices with regard to public accountability associated with ODA; identifying the approaches to accountability adopted by major donor institutions; enabling participants to develop a mature view of the problems of accountability; identifying innovative trends and tools in combating the misuse of aid, including the role for parliaments, political parties, media and civil society; and, identifying appropriate tools for monitoring ODA, ensuring transparency and involving public participation.

Among the speakers and session chairs are Cambodian opposition leader Sam Rainsy; Geert van der Linden, Vice President of the Asian Development Bank;  Democratic Party of Hong Kong’s founding chairman, Martin Lee;  Liberal International President and former speaker of Northern Ireland, the Lord Alderdice; Thai journalist Kavi Chongittavorn of The Nation;  and the  German Development Foundation’s Andreas Proksch.

CALD is an umbrella organization of liberal and democratic political parties in Asia. The current Chairman of CALD is the Hon. Franklin M. Drilon, President of the Philippine Senate.

Click here for more information on the ODA conference.

Categorised in: News Article

This post was written by CALD