By William Maclean
TUNIS (Reuters) - Africa should push with a "strong voice" for integration of its 53 national economies by making the African Development Bank (AfDB) the financing hub for transport and energy links, an independent expert panel says.
Former Mozambican President Joaquim Chissano and former Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin said the advisory group of experts that they jointly chair recommends the bank should champion the anti-poverty fight by building Africa's internal market.
"If there was one message that came through it was the absolute necessity that the continent have the infrastructure that will knit it together," Martin told Reuters in a joint interview with Chissano late on Monday.
"The one body that can speak for that is the AfDB. No matter where we went in Africa that's the view that we heard. Africa has now arrived at that point where this is really required."
Chissano and Martin will present a report by the panel to the bank at its Tunis offices later on Tuesday. The bank's board will decide a response at its annual meeting in Maputo in May.
The only multilateral development body specifically devoted to Africa, the AfDB is only the seventh largest provider of aid to the continent behind the World Bank, European Union and big bilateral lenders such as the United States, Britain and France.
But the report says the bank should now become "the channel of choice for development finance" to boost growth in Africa, where it says 300 million people still live on less than $1 a day. Much of its work currently involves financing badly-needed regional transport, energy and water projects.
Historically Africa's infrastructure has been geared to old colonial markets in Europe, resulting in economic isolation for the 40 percent of Africans who live in landlocked countries and starving local markets of cross-border roads and railways.
The panel, which includes Nobel economics laureate Joseph Stiglitz, proposes the bank have four main tasks -- investing in infrastructure, building effective states, promoting the private sector and developing skills, the summary says.
"All of the governments desire to have a very strong development bank in Africa," said Chissano. "They are aware that something has to change. They cannot live in isolation."
"They want a bank capable not only of delivering resources, helping to mobilise resources, but also of giving advice to the countries and regions and to be able to help the continent bring this problem of economic integration to a fruitful end."
MISTRUST LINGERS
"We still don't have that strong voice, particularly when it comes to this financial area. There is still some mistrust (between Africans and outside lenders)," said Chissano. "That's why we need an instrument to have a good dialogue and create trust."
The report argues that a proliferation of donors with different demands requires there be an African coordinating institution to ensure predictable funding that respects national priorities, according to a summary made available to journalists.
The AfDB, whose shareholders include Africa's 53 nations and 24 non-African donor countries, lends commercially to Africa's richest nations and lends at concessionary rates to poor ones from its Development Fund, financed largely by Western donors.
The AfDB's largest shareholder is Nigeria, with 8.7 percent of voting power on the board. The largest foreign shareholder is the United States with 6.3 percent.
"There is probably greater interest in Africa by knowledgeable investors today than I've ever seen," said Martin. "Those who recognise this earlier are the ones who are going to participate in it the most."
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