Following CLGF’s General Meeting of Members, the final day of CLGC2023 continued with a session on the conference outcomes statement. Chaired by CLGF Chairperson, Rev Mpho MW Moruakgomo, the Secretary-General of CLGF Ms Lucy Slack, was invited to present the draft recommendations emerging from the conference discussions.

Panel of reflections

This was followed by a panel session chaired by Prof Eris Schoburgh, an Associate Member of the CLGF Board, who called on five of the delegates to provide their own reflections on the recommendations and what they had heard at the Conference. Ladislas Ngendahimana, Rwanda, reflected on the importance of strengthening the relationship between levels of government in efforts to build local resilience; Dr Bhaskar Chakrabarti, India, shared some of the key outcomes from the Research Colloquium and noted the importance of data and research in strengthening local policy making; Hon Richard Frederick, St Lucia, emphasised the importance of local access to green finance in ensuring climate resilience, and reducing the impediments that local governments face in accessing resources in a timely way; on behalf of the youth cohort who participated throughout the conference, Jeremy Wagaba, from Uganda shared their recommendations, which related to strengthening youth engagement in local government and CLGF; and finally Hemanthi Goonasekera, Sri Lanka highlighted the importance of maintaining a strong focus on practical action to ensure gender equality in local government.

Conference declaration

The Chairperson welcomed the endorsement of the The Kigali Declaration on Building local resilience across the Commonwealth and commended it as a document that all members and CLGF should use to guide their work on resilience. He also confirmed that CLGF would share the declaration with the Commonwealth Secretariat and the hosts of the forthcoming CHOGM, which will have also resilience as its theme.

Video messages

Before the final presentation there were two video messages. The first was from Ms Maimunah Mohd Sharif, Executive Director of UN-Habitat, who stressed the need to continue working towards sustainable urbanisation and acceleration progress towards achieving the SDGs; and the Prime Minister of Samoa, Fiamē Naomi Mataʻafa, who emphasised the importance of resilience in the face of so many global challenges. She confirmed that the theme of CHOGM 2024 would be One Resilient Common Future: Transforming our Common Wealth  and indicated that she was looking forward to receiving the outcomes of the CLGC2023.

Ministerial closing address

The Minister of Local Government, Hon Jean Claude Musabyimana, host of the event, gave the closing address, thanking everyone for their active participation and for the meaningful outcomes. He called on everyone to focus on implementation, on strengthening decentralization, and highlighted the importance of working in partnership to build local resilience.  He thanked everyone involved in making the event a success and closed by recognizing the contribution that Rev Mpho MW Moruakgomo, out-going Chairperson of CLGF has made in steering the organization over the past six years.  He presented him with a gift to mark his time as Chairperson.