Togolese ministers adopted last Thursday, Jan 20, a new draft decree relative to the creation of administrative subdivisions across the country.

"This draft law aims to create in the territorial communities "regions" managed by elected regional councilors who will, in turn, appoint regional executives who will play an important role in local development," reads the communiqué sanctioning the Council of Ministers held that day. 

For the authorities, this is an important step toward regional elections. "The creation of these regional territorial authorities is crucial in the preparation of the upcoming regional elections," the communiqué notes.

In effect, the bill will turn Togo’s five regions into "territorial communities", just like its municipalities which are defined as "legal persons of public law with financial autonomy." The move falls under recent efforts to accelerate decentralization and strengthen local freedoms.

Besides the draft decree, the ministers, during the same council, adopted a new charter for political parties, after consultations between political actors, aimed at adapting this framework "to current realities."

Ayi Renaud Dossavi

Togo successfully closed an issue of fungible Treasury bonds on the WAMU-securities market last Friday. The country retained CFA37 billion via the operation which matures over seven (7) years and has an interest rate of 5.80%. 

Lomé was looking for CFA35 billion but mobilized a total of CFA84 billion, through 29 subscriptions from investors based in Côte d'Ivoire, Benin, Senegal, Niger, Burkina-Faso, and Togo itself. Comparing the total amount raised to that retained, the issue recorded a coverage rate of 240%.

It should be highlighted that this is Togo’s second issue on the regional market in 2022. It secured CFA27.5 billion from the first issue and eyes CFA533 billion for the whole year.

Esaïe Edoh

Togo expects CFA814 billion of tax earnings this year. The target, set in the 2022 budget law passed at the end of December 2021, will be used to finance its expenditures.

Compared to 2021 when CFA780 billion was raised, earnings that the country’s tax authority hopes to mobilize in 2022 are 4.5% higher.

Out of the CFA814 billion expected, CFA420 billion should be mobilized by the Tax Office, and CFA397 billion by the Customs and Excise Office.

It should be recalled that the OTR recently initiated various steps to achieve its objective. These include broadening the tax base, strengthening control measures, fighting tax fraud and evasion, and simplifying tax procedures.

For 2022, budget revenues are forecast at CFA1,330 billion, compared to CFA1,219.3 billion in 2021, up 9.1% year-on-year. To achieve this objective, the government plans to collect CFA58.3 billion in non-tax revenues and nearly CFA200 billion in grants from its partners. The remainder will be financed by debt, the bulk of which should be mobilized on the UMOA-titres public securities market.

In Togo, any person, business people especially, who wants to withdraw an important sum of money at the bank or similar financial institution can request a police escort, free of charge. Yark Damehane, minister for security and civil protection, said this on the TVT, a public TV station, last Wednesday - a day after a new heist had occurred in Lomé.

Requesting a police escort had always been possible but only a few citizens and economic operators did so. "It is inconceivable that an economic operator who is going to withdraw large sums of money cannot ask the police, the brigade, or the local gendarmerie to assist him," Damehane said while deploring the increase in the number of robberies in the country, and the capital Lomé especially.

The minister of security stressed that police assistance is the best protection against robbers who target people after they have withdrawn their cash from the bank. "Day and night, ask for the support of the regalian forces,” he insisted, adding that "a new robbery is one too many." 

Throughout the second half of 2021, more than CFA108 million were stolen in 24 bank robberies. 

Esaïe Edoh

Under the 2022 Finance Law, the import of agricultural equipment in Togo is exempt from duties and taxes. “From January 1 to December 31, 2022, the import of agricultural equipment is exempt from duties and taxes, with the exception of community levies," reads the bill forecasting revenue and expenditure for the year.

Introduced in 2020, as the pandemic broke out, the measure has been renewed this year, to support agricultural policies in place.  It (the measure) was part of Togo’s "Covid-19 Agricultural Response Plan," which included several emergency measures, aimed at consolidating food and nutritional security, improving the income of farmers, and coping with pressures induced by health restrictions.

It should be noted that the import relief also concerns medical equipment and products used exclusively to tackle Covid-19, according to the government.

Ayi Renaud Dossavi

Togolese civil servants should be paid about 253 billion CFA this year, the same as the amount forecast in 2021. The projection was set in the 2022 Finance Law. Voted on December 29, 2021, the latter totals CFA1,779 billion CFA. 

Wages for public workers will thus stand below 20% of the budget for 2022, in a context where the government plans to recruit 2,725 new agents throughout the year.  

While no up-to-date public data is yet available on the number of civil servants in Togo, the last census of civil servants dating from November 2011 put the number between 54,000 and 60,000. 

Esaïe Edoh

Togo moved up two places in the latest Human Freedom Index 2021, a report that measures the level of individual, civil, and economic freedom in 165 jurisdictions and states around the world. The ranking was released in December 2021.

The seventh edition of this assessment, produced by American and Canadian think tanks, Cato Institute and Fraser Institute, rates countries on 82 separate indicators of freedom (including the rule of law, safety and security, freedom of movement, religion, association, assembly and civil society, expression and information, and freedom of international trade), with scores on a scale of 0 to 10.

In this edition, Togo ranked 23rd in Africa and 113th in the world, with an overall score of 6.50. In detail, the West African country scored 6.6 on "individual freedom", 6.35 on "economic freedom", and 6.5 on the "human freedom" indicator. 

In the sub-region, the country performed relatively less well than its neighbors, notably Ghana (70th in the world), Benin (76th in the world), Côte d'Ivoire (95th in the world), and Burkina Faso (100th in the world).

At the continental level, the top three are Cape Verde (36th in the world, with a score of 8.26 out of 10), Mauritius (46th in the world, with a score of 8.07), and Botswana (53rd, with a score of 7.90). The three least "free" countries in Africa, according to the authors of the ranking are Burundi, Somalia, and Sudan, with scores of 5.02, 4.93, and 4.48 respectively.

The Urban Center for Business and Entrepreneurship (CUBE), an innovative business incubator based in Lomé, recently launched its private equity fund "KI U-INVEST" with the support of E-agribusiness, an agro-technology company.

The CFA10 million fund will finance Togolese and African SMEs. Projects backed must have passed the pilot phase and have been rolled out for at least six months. They must have well-defined customers, have validated a few sales, have existing contracts or clients that have letters of intent. 

SMEs meeting these criteria can apply latest by March 31, 2022. Two to five applicants will be selected.

"This will mainly be an Equity fund, providing credits of loans of honor with the support of business angels, local and international technical and financial partners,” CUBE indicated. "In addition to financing, SMEs picked for the KI U-INVEST Fund will benefit from an incubation program (managerial, technical, legal ...) that will help them meet the expectations of partners and capitalize on the funding that will be released,” the incubator revealed.

Preferred applicants must operate in the following sectors: agriculture and food chains, health, construction and public works, energy, financial services and fintech, biotechnology, education, and traditional industries (free zone: cosmetics, building materials, packaging, trade and marketing, import-export, telecoms, transport and logistics, wicks). 

Apply here

Ayi Renaud Dossavi

Togolese authorities are working on a project to make municipalities, especially in the outskirts of Grand Lomé, more attractive and modern. The project, Local Urbanism Plan (PLU), was launched last Friday in Noépé, the chief town of the Avé 2 municipality. 

Backed by the World Bank and steered by the ministry of urban planning, housing, and land reform, the project specifically aims to help local communities better regulate the use of their lands, in addition to bolstering their housing stock to meet the growing demand. Land reserves will be mobilized to this end. 

"The launch of this Local Urbanism Plan (PLU) project reflects the paradigm shift that we usually adopt in the development of urban and spatial planning tools," said the minister of urban planning, Koffi Tsolenyanu, who presided the launch.

The PLU, the ministry believes, will ease the development of public investment projects, make the two pilot municipalities (Avé 2 and Zio 2) it will cover more attractive, but also improve the living standards of people concerned and people living in the Greater Lomé area. 

"Indeed, the goal of the initial urban development program was always to provide all towns with more than 5,000 inhabitants with a Master Plan for Urban Development and Planning (SDAU). But, in the era of full decentralization of our country, we need to change our approach, to cover all of our municipalities leveraging local urbanism plans,” Tsolenyanu added. 

The project’s launching ceremony was an opportunity to present expected results to actors of the urban planning and land sector, as well as to people who will benefit from it. 

In the long run, the PLU should expand to all 117 municipalities of Togo.