The Associations of Regions of Mali and Burkina Faso join ORU Fogar

During the celebration of ORU Fogar's Annual Assembly on November 20th, the Association of Regions of Mali and the Association of Regions of Burkina Faso definitively joined ORU Fogar. The step was celebrated by ORU Fogar's president, Rachid el Abdi, who in his inauguration had expressed the will to expand and strengthen the presence of the network in the African continent. The President of the Association of Regions of Mali, who is also President of the Regional Council of Mopti, Abdoulaye Garba Maïga, took the floor to point out that this incorporation to global regionalism meant reinforcing the will of decentralisation existing in the country.

With the incorporation of these two associations, there are now 7 associations of African national regions that are part of ORU Fogar. Starting from the North, the Association of Regions of Morocco, the Association of Departments of Senegal, the Association of Regions of Niger (ARENI), the Association of Regions and Districts of Côte d'Ivoire ARDCI and the Council of Governors of Kenya are part of the network.

The Assembly also saw the incorporation of some African regions. From Senegal, the regional councils of Gossas, Dagana and Saraya joined. The president of Dagana, Ababacar Kalifa Ndao, was among those who took the floor to express the will of the African regions to participate in the debates on the Global Agenda. The West region was the first region of Cameroon to align itself with ORU Fogar. Its president, Jules Hilaire Focka, present at the meeting, expressed his satisfaction for being a pioneer in this incorporation, but expressed his confidence that other Cameroonian regions would follow suit.

Three Latin American regions also joined the organisation: the Ecuadorian provincial governments of Pichincha and Manabí and the Colombian department of Sucre. The prefect Leonardo Orlando of Manabí and the governor of Sucre, Héctor Olimpo Espinosa, took the floor to express their commitment to the organisation. The prefect of Azuay, Juan Cristóbal Lloret, also took the floor to signal the return of the province to ORU Fogar. It should be recalled that the prefect of Azuay, Paul Carrasco, had been president of ORU Fogar, but his successor in the Prefecture had withdrawn from the organisation.