Practical Info

About

Context

The Africa and Arab Countries Regional Delegates Conference (AFRECON) 2025 convenes amid urgent and intersecting crises that underscore the immediate need to reimagine public services as a cornerstone of human dignity and human rights. Africa and the Arab Region face systemic challenges shaped by colonial legacies, neoliberal economic policies, and climate breakdown.

This concept note provides a framework that seeks to provide insight into AFRECON theme, Quality Public Services for Dignity by highlighting the challenges underpinning the many challenges facing the public services in the region of Africa and Arab Countries; the conceptualization of what entails the provision of public services that is of quality and underscores human dignity; the objectives guiding keynote speakers, presenters, moderators and panel members; the methodological approach to rendering the conferences, including the framing of main issues and cross-cutting ones.

Background

Public services are the backbone of a just and equitable society, ensuring access to healthcare, education, sanitation, social protection, and infrastructure for all. Quality public services are not merely a convenience; they are a fundamental right that upholds human dignity, social justice, and sustainable development. The conference, under the theme "Quality Public Services for Dignity," will deliberate on the critical role of public services in shaping dignified societies, highlighting the profound importance of this theme.

Politically, democratic backsliding, corruption, and weak governance plague many states in the Region, eroding trust in institutions and limiting their ability to deliver the services so urgently needed. Economically, the regions remain trapped in raw material extraction economies, with multinational corporations (MNCs) and international financial institutions (IFIs) like the IMF perpetuating dependency through debt traps and austerity mandates. Sub-Saharan Africa's debt-to-GDP ratio surged to 57% in 2022 (World Bank, 2023), diverting funds from public services to repayments. Over 40% of sub-Saharan Africa's population lives below the poverty line (UNDP, 2023), while gender inequality remains entrenched. Women constitute 70% of Africa's informal workforce yet earn 30% less than men (ILO, 2022). Refugees, internally displaced persons (IDPs), and youth face systemic exclusion, exacerbated by privatised healthcare and education, while only 17% of African workers have social security coverage (ILO, 2023). Climate catastrophe intensifies vulnerabilities. The Arab Region is warming twice as fast as the global average (IPCC, 2022), while Cyclone Freddy (2023) displaced 500,000 in Malawi and Mozambique, overwhelming clinics serving one doctor per 10,000 people (WHO). Such crises strain underfunded public services, demanding urgent, dignified responses.

Public service unions, however, are not standing idly by. From South Africa's #EndAusterity campaigns to Jordan's healthcare strikes, workers assert that quality public services are a right, not a commodity, inspiring hope and determination in these challenges.

Advancing the fight within a framework of quality public services and dignity

  1. Accessibility and Universal Coverage: Public services must be universally accessible, reaching all citizens regardless of socio-economic status, gender, geographical location, or demographic background. Such accessibility includes ensuring adequate infrastructure and resources to guarantee equitable access to healthcare, education, and social protection services.
  2. Adequate Public Financing: Sustainable and quality public services require sufficient public investment. Governments must commit to progressive taxation policies, eliminate tax avoidance and illicit financial flows, and increase budget allocations for essential public services. Privatisation and underfunding of public services undermine quality and widen inequalities. Austerity measures, which typically involve deep cuts to public spending and social services, often worsen economic hardship during financial crises by reducing demand, increasing unemployment, and weakening essential public infrastructure. Rather than stabilizing the economy, they entrench inequality and slow down recovery. It must be rejected.
  3. Fair Working Conditions for Public Sector Workers: The dignity of public services is inherently linked to the dignity of the workers delivering them. Fair wages, job security, safe working conditions, and respect for trade union rights are essential in ensuring that public sector workers can effectively provide quality services.
  4. Democratic Governance and Accountability: Effective public service delivery requires transparent governance structures that involve workers, communities, and civil society in decision-making processes. State institutions, trade unions, and Civil society organisations must hold Governments accountable for ensuring public service policies are responsive to societal needs.
  5. Climate Resilience and Sustainability: Public services must be adapted to address climate change challenges. Investment in sustainable infrastructure, renewable energy, and disaster risk reduction measures is crucial in ensuring long-term service delivery.
  6. Dignity as a Right of Workers and Society: Dignity is a cornerstone of human rights and social justice. It manifests in the ability of individuals and communities to access essential services without discrimination, exploitation, or undue hardship. The right to dignity within public services extends to:
    1. Workers' Dignity: Workers in public services must be treated with respect and provided with fair compensation, safe and healthy working conditions, and the right to unionise and collectively bargain. When Governments and employers respect workers' rights, service delivery improves, benefiting society.
    2. Social Dignity: Quality public services are the foundation of social dignity. Accessible healthcare ensures the well-being of individuals, education empowers communities, and social protection systems prevent poverty and marginalisation.
    3. Economic Dignity: Public services contribute to inclusive economic development by providing employment, fostering gender equality, and reducing economic inequalities. When public services are underfunded or privatised, the most vulnerable suffer disproportionately, deepening economic disparities.

Objectives of Deliberations

The keynote speeches, panel sessions, workshops and other deliberations should contribute to realising the following objectives:

  1. Elaborate a rights-based framework for "quality public service" rooted in dignity, equity, and intersectionality.
  2. Share strategies to counter austerity, privatisation, and exclusion in service delivery.
  3. Strengthen solidarity among unions, civil society, and governments to resist corporate capture of public services.
  4. Highlight the importance of organising to build power to fight back and secure a life of dignity through quality public services;
  5. Emphasise the need to mobilise all groups within the union spectrum.
  6. Develop policy demands, engage policy spaces at national, regional and global levels and strategies to influence.

Methodology and Approaches

Deliberations will blend formal presentations, participatory workshops (pre-conference and side events), and peer learning. Specifically, the keynote should address systemic solutions from experts, followed by panel discussions and debates in session. Marketplace Sessions and other innovative strategies should be featured during workshops to ensure effective participation of audiences.

Framing and cross-cutting issues

The framing of issues and discussions would seek to reclaim public services to assure a life of dignity with a shared understanding that dignity is non-negotiable in the delivery of public services. It should also project innovative ideas towards identifying solutions to enhance accessibility of quality public services, including emphasising the fact that digitalization in public services should enhance public service delivery, secure the rights of workers to their data and put public data in the hands of public institutions . They should also be framed around solidarity actions through alliances to advance the fight for system change.

A feminist political economy lens should apply to all sessions; mainstreaming just transition principles, participation of young workers; demand accountability from regional organizations on their role to ensure quality public services; the fact that insecurity as a result of wars, illegal occupations etc are a threat to access to quality public services; and ratification and domestications of relevant ILO conventions.

Expected Outputs

  1. Conference Declaration enshrining commitments to dignity-driven public services.
  2. A Regional Program of Action, including strategy document on sub-regional political work and regional growth. This will include a reviewed and enhanced Young Workers Education and Mentorship Program.
  3. Repository of all conference materials that will be accessible to all participants post- conference.
  4. A clear message and political agenda on how the region intend to work, including strengthening various national, sub-regional and regional structures.

Conclusion

Hopefully, this framework ensures that the conference goes beyond talking sessions to catalyse change. By focusing on public service for dignity, the deliberations will challenge extractive economics and reclaim the state's role from corporate capture as a guarantor of rights. As the Rwandan proverb goes, "Agaciro kavandimwe"—dignity is shared.