On Friday 5th April 2013 in Rabat, Mr Nizar BARAKA, Minister of Economy and Finance and Mr Rupert Joy, Ambassador of the European Union to Morocco, chaired the Closing Ceremony of the institutional Twinning between Morocco and the European Union, in the presence of Mr Nasser BOURITA, Secretary General of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, the German Ambassador and the representative of the UK Ambassador.
For the last 24 months the Twinning has brought together the Directorate of Public Enterprises and Privatisation (DEPP) of the Ministry of Economy and Finance (Kingdom of Morocco) and the Federal Ministry of Economy and Technology (Federal Republic of Germany) in partnership with the Northern Ireland Public Sector Consulting organisation-NI-CO.
This institutional Twinning financed by the European Union in the amount of 970,000 Euros, represents the 100th Twinning project in the European neighbourhood and follows the Plan of Action Programme between Morocco and the EU (P3A III). Its objectives were to reinforce the institutional capacities of DEPP in the area of Public Private Partnerships (PPP), and of good governance and financial information in Public Enterprises.
During the course of this Twinning, DEPP benefited from the experience of 40 experts coming from different European legal traditions ?which encouraged harmonisation of Moroccan practices with the Acquis Communautaire.
``Implementing this institutional Twinning project has achieved to a high level of satisfaction, the objectives that were originally set out with our Moroccan partners,`` declared Mr Rupert Joy the EU Ambassador to Morocco, ``we have achieved a positive result.`` The results achieved have been highly satisfactory for the three subject areas that were the purpose of the Twinning, not only in terms of real progress but also in terms of producing new tools and norms (laws, regulations, reference works etc), new structures established (PPP Unit, Working Group on Governance etc) and knowledge and know-how shared with the partners of DEPP (departments in Ministries, Public Enterprises...).
Amongst the main achievements of the Twinning included improvements to the mode of governance in Public Enterprises, their management and oversight of their economic and financial performance as well as a contribution to the elaboration of the draft law and Public Private Partnerships (PPP) which aims to conform to best international practices.