The African Leadership Forum (ALF) in collaboration with the Foundation for Security Development in Africa (FOSDA) is to organise an African regional conference for Parliamentarians in Accra from April 18 to 20, 2002.

The conference is to discuss recent strategic development initiatives by African countries and the need for the continent as an entity to evolve a series of initiatives to enable it to deal with its own problems based on an African agenda.

Ms Afi Yakubu, Associate Director of FOSDA, told the Ghana News Agency in an interview in Accra yesterday, that the continent needed an agenda, managed and designed principally to promote and foster African interest with the active involvement of the international community.

She cited the most recent significant Africa's response mechanism as the Conference on Security, Stability Development and Co-operation in Africa (CSSDCA) and the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) both of which were to function within the composite framework of the African Union (AU).

Ms Yakubu said the Accra Conference intended to bring together African parliamentarians to discuss, analyse and take a common position on these new initiatives in the hope that it would assist the lawmakers to fashion out a framework for their effective participation.

Mr Ayodele Aderinwale, Executive Director of ALF, said the main objectives of the conference include; establishment of an African network of parliamentarians that would help in advancing the CSSDCA, NEPAD and the AU and create a broad based awareness among key African parliamentarians on the importance and relevance of the three initiatives.

The Conference would also be used to facilitate and strengthen the capacity of the African parliamentarians with a view to developing strategies and modalities for influencing policies and decisions of various governments to reflect the CSSDCA, NEPAD and the AU in national legislation.

Conflict prevention, resolution and management and economic development and co-operation would also be on the agenda.

ALF is an African based non-governmental and non-profit making policy organisation with special focus on issues of good governance and leadership development on the continent.