Togo First
NSIA Togo lands contract to provide health insurance to municipal councilors
The Togolese government announced that henceforth, all city councilors in the country will have health insurance financed by the State. The concerned officials will benefit from the measure in exchange for a financial contribution that matches their capacities, the Presidency’s official website noted.
According to the same source, NSIA Group won the tender to deploy the project. The latter was officially launched last Friday, by the minister of territorial administration and decentralization, Payadowa Boukpessi. The insurance recipients received a health passport on this occasion.
“We would like to sincerely thank the Head of State for this act of solidarity towards the local elects. Through this gesture, the President of the Republic just guaranteed us social security in regards to health,” said Koamy Gomado, Mayor of Golfe 1 and Vice-President of Faîtière des communes du Togo (FCT).
In detail, this social security provides two insurance policies to all local elected officials of the 117 municipalities, namely health insurance and individual accident insurance.
The first of the two policies covers 750 municipal councilors who do not yet have health insurance, and the second guarantees the reimbursement of medical expenses to treat injuries sustained in an accident and, in the worst-case scenario, the payment of a capital sum to the insured or his or her beneficiaries in the event of disability or death.
In addition, the NSIA group individual accident insurance covers all 1,527 councilors who are insured for a capital of 5 million CFA francs in case of death or disability following an accident and 500,000 CFA francs for medical expenses.
As a reminder, the move is part of the universal health insurance process, which has been underway in Togo for several months.
Ayi Renaud Dossavi
Covid-19: Togo has received 3.5 million vaccine doses since March 2021
Togo received 199,800 new doses of Astrazeneca vaccines from France last Saturday, Nov 6. The new provision brings the total number of vaccines that the country has received since it launched its vaccination campaign last March to 3.5 million doses. The information was disclosed by the Togolese health authorities.
In detail, Togo has received a total of 800,000 doses of Astrazeneca vaccines since March 2021. They were provided under France’s Covax initiative. A few weeks back, it should be recalled, Emmanuel Macron promised that his country would give out, by the end of the year, 60 million doses of vaccines to help developing nations tackle the pandemic.
Now that Togo has enough doses, more than one million according to its health authorities, it is planning new strategies to deploy vaccination teams across the country.
Togo, data from the Financial Times indicates, is WAEMU’s most vaccinated member State.
Esaïe Edoh
Togo’s pension fund, CNSS, invests significantly in Togolese banks
While its shares in real property and other important projects are well known, the National Social Security Fund also has stakes in the banking sector. Among others, the institution headed by Ingrid Awadé has invested some of its massive surplus in Orabank and Oragroup, Ecobank, BIA, or African Lease (both the subsidiary and the group).
The National Social Security Fund (CNSS) does not only manage social contributions; it is also an important investor, both in the local real estate and banking sectors.
It has minor stakes in two of the country’s largest banks, by market shares: Orabank Togo and Ecobank Togo
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According to the latest available data (dating from December 2020) obtained by Togo First, the Fund has an 8.37% stake in Orabank Togo, and 5.25% in Ecobank Togo, the country’s second-biggest bank.
The CNSS also holds 8.2% of BIA, the subsidiary of the Moroccan group Attijariwafa.
Besides traditional banks, the state-controlled private-public utility company also invests in new financial entities. It holds respectively 32.5% and 8% of African Lease Group (ALG) and its subsidiary African Lease Togo which specializes in leasing, factoring, and bonding.
As mentioned above, the pension fund also invests in real estate, notably the Renaissance Residence project. It invested CFA17 billion in the Saint Pérégrin hospital (under construction) and is one of the shareholders of the Société Nouvelle de Boissons (SNB), a new brewer. Through Kifema Capital, an investment vehicle steered by Togo Invest, the CNSS holds shares in the Kekeli Efficient Power plant.
Togo is not the only country in the region to have a pension fund with diversified investments. In Niger, Burkina Faso, and Benin also, pension funds invest in various financial institutions.
Ayi Renaud Dossavi
2,000 Togolese to get free cataract surgeries by June 2022, govt announces
The Togolese government will provide, by June 2022, free surgeries to 2,000 people suffering from cataracts. According to the deputy minister for universal healthcare, Mamissilé Akla Agba-Assih, this will be done through the “Mana Messè” program which she officially launched yesterday.
With this campaign, the authorities hope to improve the coverage, access, and quality of cataract surgeries in the country. They want to increase the number of surgeries from 530 now to 1,500 (for a million inhabitants) in 2023. Minister Agba-Assih said: “4,000 cataract surgeries could be done by 2023, which would represent over 30% of the target nationwide.”
Also, she stressed, this campaign “is coherent with the 2019-2023 strategy of the National Plan for Fighting Blindness, specifically its third component which focuses on reducing cataract-induced blindness cases.”
The Mana Messè program is the fruit of a 10-year partnership between the government of Togo and Mercy Ships
Esaïe Edoh
Fraudulent imports cost Togo nearly CFA11 billion in tax earnings, between 2019-2021
Togo lost nearly CFA11 billion in 2019-2021 due to fraudulent imports, data from the country’s tax authority (OTR) shows. The government and the private sector thus decided to take the matter into their hands during the 3rd session of the State-Private Sector consultation framework held in Lomé yesterday, Nov 4.
According to the Togolese authorities, fraudulent imports, smuggling, false declarations, and dumping truly hamper Togo’s economic development.
"It emerged from the discussions that this is a real scourge that hurts both investment and local companies because these practices lead to the loss of jobs, poor sales, bankruptcy, and favor unfair competition. For the State, it means less tax income," said Rose Mivedor, Minister for Investment Promotion.
For her part, Victoire Tomegah-Dogbé, the Prime Minister, noted a resurgence of the phenomenon, despite the various mechanisms and regulations that the State has set up to tackle it.
"There are concrete measures to curb this plague. These measures start with monitoring by public actors. Also, the operationalization of the automated marking system can help reduce the impact of these practices," the Prime Minister said during the meeting. She then added: "We recognize that the measures that are taken both need to be reinforced and implemented more effectively. And everyone will have to play their part."
To deal with the issue at hand, the meeting’s participants made recommendations to improve the government’s actions and initiatives.
These include improving and reinforcing the legal and institutional framework in the sector, applying planned sanctions, strengthening the mechanism for monitoring imported goods, and setting up agricultural police.
The 3rd session of the State-Private Sector consultation framework aligns with the government’s priorities aimed at sustaining a permanent, dynamic framework for discussion with private sector actors. This, the authorities believe, will ultimately boost the country’s business climate.
Esaïe Edoh
Togo: Tax Authority recruits more peer educators to promote tax payment nationwide
Satisfied with the results of the peer educators it recruited and dispatched in 2019, Togo’s tax authority (OTR) has decided to get more. From 274, the number of educators will increase to 600 this year. A training workshop was recently launched to this end.
“We have recruited 326 new peer educators, making a total of 600 who will, over the 2021-2022 period, relay our laws, decisions, and information related to the general tax code to populations and taxpayers,” said Assindoh Mouhamed Nour-Dine, OTR’s Director of Communication and Services during the workshop. “Our goal is to cover the whole country, to sensitize and educate taxpayers,” he added.
Mainly, the peer educators will encourage people to pay their taxes and teach those willing to do so how they should proceed.
“Tax compliance is achieved by getting people to voluntarily pay their taxes without coercion,” the OTR official explained.
Topics taught to the newly-recruited trainees include fundamentals of tax administration, fiscal challenges in Togo in 2022, and communication with populations.
Ayi Renaud Dossavi
Local consumption: Government holds meeting to boost cooperation between local actors
In line with efforts to boost the consumption of local products, the Togolese ministry for trade and local consumption launched last Tuesday a meeting with several actors of the local production chain. The goal of the meeting is to improve cooperation among these actors.
Dedicated to the fishery and poultry sectors, the meeting aimed to raise the quality of goods produced locally and make sure they sell well both in the country and in Africa.
"We must address all links in the chain, produce in quantity and quality and be competitive to meet local demand and secure a place in the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA)," said the minister for local consumption, Kodjo Adédzé, who added that Togo "has the potential to meet these challenges" through a coordination action of the government.
Adédzé also stressed that the meeting “should help, concretely and objectively, boost actions aimed at promoting local consumption in Togo.”
Togo, let’s recall, is currently promoting the consumption of local goods through the second edition of the “consuming local” month launched on Oct 15.
Esaïe Edoh
Togo: WAEMU ends its review on the implementation of community reforms today
The WAEMU commission ends its 7th annual review of reforms, policies, programs, and community projects implemented in Togo, and how they align with the Union’s prescriptions. The meeting started last Wednesday.
“Over the past three years, our country distinguished itself as one of the WAEMU States that made a major leap, with an average rate for the implementation of community reforms rising from 64% in 2018 to 78% in 2020, up 7% per year on average,” Kossi Toffio, the Representative of the minister of economy and finance, said at the review’s opening.
According to Aminata Lo Paye, representative of the WAEMU Commission in Togo, the review will be “based on the weighing grid agreed upon” by countries in the Union.
This annual review, like previous ones, looks at regulations imposed in various areas such as economic governance, the regional money market, sectoral policies, to achieve harmonization and integration, at the regional level.
Togo: Fire breaks out near the port of Lomé
A fire broke out in the port area today, November 4. According to initial information that Togo First gathered from residents, the fire started at the foam and mattress manufacturing plant, near the refinery, not far from the Lomé Port Authority.
"Emergency measures have been deployed to control the fire and minimize material damage. We extend all our solidarity to the management and staff affected by this incident," said the Togolese Ministry of Maritime Economy and Coastal Protection.
The fire department was immediately dispatched to the scene.
Banque de Développement du Mali is now operational in Togo
The Development Bank of Mali (Banque de Développement du Mali - BDM) has opened its doors today, Nov 4. The news was disclosed by the lender’s management.
The Malian lender, which is headed in Togo by Souleymane Keita, will carry out all sorts of “financial transactions, commercial, industrial and securities.”
BDM-Togo is registered at the Centre for Business Formalities (CFE). Its objective is “to participate by all means in all operations, be it financial, commercial, real estate or securities-related, directly or indirectly connected to its mission and likely to foster development.”
Esaïe Edoh