NEWS

         

In view of the future launch of the EU funded project "Metropolitan Governance of the Energy Transition (MGET)", a delegation of the Metropolis Secretariat General met with representatives of the Delegation of the European Union to Senegal and a variety of stakeholders from the City of Dakar administration.

From the 13th to the 15th of January, Metropolis Secretary General and the Head of Administration and Finance for the Secretariat general, Mr. Octavi de la Varga and Ms. Federica Biondi, held meetings with the Mayor of the City of Dakar, Mrs. Soham el Wardini, her team, various heads of departments that will be involved in the MGET project, and Mr. Boubacar Draba, representative of the Delegation of the European Union to Senegal (DEU), in charge of monitoring MGET.

The general objectives of these meetings were to adjust the last details of MGET, a three-year project aiming to complement, with a metropolitan dimension, the urban governance of the energy transition initiated by the City of Dakar with its Territorial Plan for Climate & Energy - PCE (the acronym for its original name in French, Plan Climat Énergie Territorial), launched in 2017.

The meeting between the DEU, City of Dakar representatives, and Metropolis Secretariat General, on the 13th, was the occasion for the EU representatives to recall that MGET was aligned with the new EU Green Deal, an ambitious package of measures accompanying a sustainable green transition. The exchanges revolved around the ways to make the most of the project activities by attempting to introduce some reflections on other themes of sustainable development such as mobility or public green spaces. A provisional agreement between the parties on the official launch date of the project targeted the week of the 9th of May, or Europe Day. The idea is to integrate the launch of MGET within the activities organized by the DEU during that week, in order to get the maximum media coverage as possible.

While meeting Mayor El Wardini and her team, also on the 13th, Octavi de la Varga recalled that “MGET was designed in such a way that it would complement the program "Dakar Clean City" -Dakar Ville Propre in French - by developing an energy part of the program”. Dakar Ville propre was launched by Mayor El Wardini, and develops strategies to enhance public green spaces, improve the cleanliness of public spaces and beautify the city, implementing activities accompanied by the cultural actors of the city (more than 120 people) and spread over the 19 communes of Dakar.

In the last two days, meetings were held with various representatives of the Dakar City administration. Mrs. Henriette Niang Kandé, Head of the Press and Communication Department of the City of Dakar, underlined the importance to rely on the Dakar Municipal Radio, to reach out to the different communities of Dakar, especially informal workers, as they form a great part of the audience. As MGET activities during the 2nd year of implementation will include civil society, the Dakar municipal Radio will be crucial.

Mr. Serigne Leye Thioune, Director for the Technical Services of the City, recalled that the appropriation by the different actors involved in a project is key for that project to succeed. Appropriation by the technical services of the City, but also the population will be crucial for MGET, if it aims at leaving sustainable results after its lifespan.

The meeting with Mr. Moussa Tine, Director of the Community of Agglomerations of Dakar (CADAK), which regroups the cities of Dakar, Pikine, and Guédiawaye and representing the metropolitan territory of Dakar, touched upon the different ways that the project can reach metropolitan scale. As metropolitan governance is at the heart of MGET, further exchanges with the CADAK will be important.

Finally, a technical meeting with the coordination team of the PCET was held in order to look for ways to foster the synergies between the two projects.

 The next steps of the project will be the selection of the coordination team in Dakar, the writing of the communication plan and the preparations of the launch ceremony.

For more information on MGET and other decentralized cooperation projects, please contact Mr. Guillaume Berret of the Metropolis Secretariat General.