THE 12th Bureau Members of the African Ministerial Conference on Housing and Urban Development (AMCHUD) are seeking the establishment of a permanent secretariat to be hosted by Kenya.The request was made at a two-day meeting here earlier this month hosted by Morocco's Minister of Housing, Urbanisation and Territorial Planning. Officials said that they also discussed a draft constitution and rules of procedure, a resource mobilisation strategy and preparations for the AMCHUD IV session to be held in Nairobi in 2012.A special session of the African Ministerial Conference on Housing and Urban Development (AMCHUD) was held in April 2011, immediately prior to the 23rd session of the Governing Council (GC-23) of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT) had welcomed the Bamako Declaration and Action Plan adopted by the African Ministerial Conference on Housing and Urban Development (AMCHUD) in November 2010, noted the commitment by AMCHUD member states to make an annual contribution of $10,000 to support AMCHUD's programmes, AMCHUD's decision to establish a permanent secretariat and accept Kenya's offer to host it, and invited UN-HABITAT to continue to support AMCHUD in its implementation of resolutions and action plans, and to provide financial and capacity support to its work programme.The Bureau members also deliberated on the theme for AMCHUD IV, preparations for the sixth session of the World Urban Forum and the Rio +20. They examined the monitoring of previous AMCHUD resolutions, collaboration with other relevant African ministerial conferences such as the African Ministerial Council on Water (AMCOW), the African Ministerial Conference on the Environment (AMCEN) and the All Africa Ministerial Conference on Decentralisation and Local Development (AMCOD).Officials said that the talks also included contributions to the next African Cities Report and the implementation by AMCHUD members of the international Guidelines on Decentralisation and Access to Basic Services for All.The aim of the special session was to review progress in implementing the Bamako Declaration and Action Plan, which spells out the commitment of African governments to improve land governance to tackle housing and sustainable urban development challenges. Issues relating to the implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the AMCHUD action plan and the activities of the AMCHUD Secretariat were also discussed.During the session, 15 countries made presentations on their progress in implementing the Bamako Declaration and Action Plan. Member states also endorsed AMCHUD's work plan and budget, as well as Kenya's proposal to host AMCHUD's permanent secretariat. The session resulted in nine recommendations aimed at strengthening the capacity of the AMCHUD secretariat, including recommendations to develop a communication strategy for better collection and dissemination of information and follow-up, endorse the draft resolution of AMCHUD to GC-23 and identify and assign representatives to the drafting committee of resolutions of GC-23.
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