VZCZCXRO7249
PP RUEHTRO
DE RUEHAS #1763/01 3431509
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 091509Z DEC 07
FM AMEMBASSY ALGIERS
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 4966
INFO RUEHAD/AMEMBASSY ABU DHABI 0559
RUEHRB/AMEMBASSY RABAT 2048
RUEHTRO/AMEMBASSY TRIPOLI
RUEHTU/AMEMBASSY TUNIS 6906
RUEHCL/AMCONSUL CASABLANCA 3155

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 ALGIERS 001763 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
TUNIS FOR KWOLCOTT, PMULREAN 
DEPT FOR NEA/PI - KGROSS, CBOURGEOIS, OKIRBY, LSCHULZ 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL PGOV KDEM KPAO AG
SUBJECT: ALGIERS MEPI UPDATE 
 
REF: A. ALGIERS 1560 
 
     ¶B. ALGIERS 0794 
     ¶C. ALGIERS 0966 
 
¶1.  SUMMARY: Progress continued slowly but steadily in MEPI 
programs and initiatives in Algeria during the period of July 
1 through October 31.  MEPI programs remain a key element of 
our effort to fulfill the political, economic and education 
reform goals in our Mission Strategic Plan.  During this 
period, we further developed our local partners in Algerian 
government ministries, though the pool of qualified local 
implementers stayed comparatively small and static. 
Effective civil society partners in Algeria remain in scarce 
supply, with individuals often wearing more than one hat and 
surfacing in more than one MEPI program.  In general, 
progress on political and economic reform remains slow; we 
closed out one project on voter education early because the 
implementer was nervous about getting approvals from the GoA 
and was itself disorganized.  By contrast, engagement in 
education and business training has borne greater fruit more 
quickly.  We continue to push for openings for greater 
reform, and MEPI is the best means we have to work towards 
this end.  END SUMMARY. 
 
JOURNALISM DEVELOPMENT GROUP (JDG) 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶2.  Into the second year of the project and after breaking 
with its partner New York University, JDG ran into problems, 
including protracted budget negotiations and difficulties 
obtaining visas.  These factors contributed to the departure 
of JDG's two international consultants, a delay in beginning 
work with new media outlets, and requests for reimbursements 
that raised questions about the future of the program.  The 
Deputy Director of the MEPI Tunis office visited in October 
to investigate the financial and programming status of the 
project and to develop a work plan with the JDG director. 
JDG completed his work with the Arabic-language daily 
Echourouk el Youmi in mid-October but will continue to 
provide advice and guidance as needed.  The program is now 
back on track with two new international consultants hired, 
and work beginning with the French-language daily Le Jeune 
Independent on November 25 after the arrival of the first 
international consultant.  Work will begin with the 
Arabic-language daily El Youm in late November or early 
December, with the arrival of the second consultant.  The JDG 
program has been among the most effective of our MEPI 
programs in the last two years; both of the Arabic dailies it 
worked with in 2006 substantially revamped their publications 
and improved their quality and sales. 
 
FINANCIAL SERVICES VOLUNTEER CORPS (FSVC) 
----------------------------------------- 
 
¶3.  On July 9-11, FSVC hosted a seminar on risk management 
and commercial lending in cooperation with the Algerian 
Central Bank.  The seminar served to improve commercial bank 
capacity to provide credit and other financial services, 
particularly to small and medium enterprises.  During the 
seminar, FSVC also identified three banks that reacted 
positively to the training and made a clear request for 
further technical support.  A follow-on seminar aimed at 
those banks was scheduled for December 4.  This program 
meshes well with upcoming Mission work involving the U.S. 
Treasury Department and the Algerian Central Bank in the 
realm of banking supervision and future program work 
involving small and medium enterprise business lending. 
 
PARTNERSHIP SCHOOLS PROGRAM (PSP) 
--------------------------------- 
 
¶4.  From September 8-12, PSP carried out English as a Foreign 
Language (EFL) training for trainers in Setif.  The first 
three days of the training were devoted to working with 
education ministry inspectors based in Setif and Blida.  The 
PSP activity was geared towards producing a draft Teacher 
Competency Framework, a document with the potential to change 
ministry of education policy on evaluating and improving 
teacher performance.  PSP made significant progress on a 
working first draft of the document, which will now be 
reviewed and edited by a larger audience within the ministry. 
 Additional work on the framework document will be completed 
using the online "Blackboard" website which the ministry's 
School for International Training has established for 
inspectors. 
 
 
ALGIERS 00001763  002 OF 003 
 
 
¶5.  PSP also held a workshop for 17 high school education 
inspectors designated "Master Trainers" by the ministry.  The 
workshop was aimed at exposing the group to the PSP program 
and its successes to date, gaining a better understanding of 
their professional duties and responsibilities, and assessing 
their understanding of competency-based teaching and 
evaluation.  It also introduced the group to the Teacher 
Competency Framework and the Algerian English Teaching 
Framework, which serve as the basis for curriculum revisions 
being contemplated by the ministry.  PSP has been a good 
success thus far, and from October 18-31, an assessment team 
from Management Systems International (MSI) visited to assess 
the program and review its three primary components of EFL, 
e-math and school linkages.  The evaluators told us that the 
PSP had affected over 5,000 Algerian students and over 100 
teachers directly.  We expect official feedback from the 
assessment visit shortly.  Looking longer term, the PSP 
programs all are basically pilot projects and we are working 
to get the Algerian Education Ministry to provide more 
financing to extend the pilots to more parts of Algeria. 
 
COMMERCIAL LAW DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM (CLDP) 
----------------------------------------- 
 
¶6.  CLDP also engages with the Algerian judiciary and legal 
system as part of our larger effort to promote an independent 
and professional judiciary.  On October 20-22, CLDP led a 
seminar in cooperation with the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) on 
building judicial capacity in commercial law.  With the help 
of the Expert Accountants Association, CLDP developed 
Algeria-specific pedagogical materials and case studies for 
the seminar and workshop, which were taught by a visiting 
American judge from New York.  CLDP led visits to several 
small and medium enterprises (SME) by 17 Algerian judges who 
are experts in commercial law.  The main idea was to 
encourage discussions between judges and SME owners over how 
better to resolve commercial conflicts in Algeria.  The 
visits also served to lay the groundwork for an intensive 
case study seminar to be held December 1-3.  This CLDP 
program has been ground-breaking in terms of developing our 
relationship with the Ministry of Justice; these contacts 
will help secure a deeper ABA program here (see below).  CLDP 
also met with the MFA in October to formally propose a 
commercial attaches program, the capstone of which will be 
consultations/training for Algerian commercial officers in 
the U.S. 
 
AMERICAN BAR ASSOCIATION (ABA) 
------------------------------ 
 
¶7.  ABA's Legal and Judicial Development Program culminated a 
year-long project with a July regional workshop on judicial 
ethics in cooperation with the Algerian Judges' Syndicate. 
As a direct result of the project, Algeria adopted a charter 
of judicial ethics.  ABA also succeeded in putting together a 
meeting of judges from Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco, during 
which participants proposed the initiative of creating a 
Maghreb-wide judges association.  The event marked a notable 
increase in the ability and willingness of the judges' 
syndicates to assume greater institutional effectiveness and 
independence.  In September, ABA's Morocco-based implementer 
met with officials from the MOJ to develop a 2008 work plan 
targeting the Judicial Training School, the National Judges 
Syndicate, and, for the first time, bar associations outside 
Algiers, including Oran and Constantine.  The Justice 
Ministry requested a formal memorandum of understanding with 
ABA to cover those elements of the work plan that involve 
government institutions.  Negotiations on the draft MOU are 
expected in December, and this MOU should enable ABA to stand 
up its own office in Algeria which will make it far more 
effective and influential. 
 
NATIONAL CONFERENCE OF STATE LEGISLATURES (NCSL) 
--------------------------------------------- --- 
 
¶8.  NCSL's program manager visited Algeria in October, 
meeting with four Algerian parliamentarians from different 
political parties to introduce them to NCSL's program and 
discuss the technical and training needs of the Algerian 
parliament.  NCSL also met with the parliamentary speaker and 
the director of the Legislative Study Training Institute 
(IFEL) to explore other possible channels of engagement. 
Since those meetings, our contacts in parliament have been 
cautious about NCSL, stressing the importance of engaging 
both the Senate and the lower house of parliament (APN). 
They have also highlighted the importance to them of 
 
ALGIERS 00001763  003 OF 003 
 
 
responding to the needs they express, and engaging the entire 
spectrum of political parties.  For our part, we remain 
uncertain about the will of the new parliamentary leadership 
to promote an expanded, more substantive role for the 
national legislature in the political process.  Under the 
no-cost extension to the NCSL work plan granted last summer, 
the next NCSL workshops in Algiers (on bill drafting) are 
expected to take place in January and February 2008. 
 
MIDDLE EAST ENTREPRENEURS TRAINING (MEET) 
----------------------------------------- 
 
¶9.  Recruitment for three MEET programs in 2008 went very 
smoothly, and the Mission's engaging private Algerian 
business associations provided a broader pool of candidates. 
Cooperation with the Beyster Institute and their local 
implementing partner was very efficient, and a pool of 
several hundred initial applications came from all over the 
country.  We were able to select nine outstanding people for 
nomination on November 11.  The interviews were the result of 
a selection process that began in July.  The candidates come 
from all over Algeria, fulfilling our goal of spreading out 
MEPI programs beyond Algiers.  For all of the nine candidates 
selected, the experience marked their first interaction with 
MEPI and the U.S. Embassy.  The three two-week MEET training 
sessions will be held in 2008 in Casablanca, Alexandria and 
Amman.  This year's MEET process was also noteworthy as it 
introduced us to a new and effective local implementer. 
 
FOUNDATION FOR THE PROMOTION OF HEALTH AND RESEARCH 
DEVELOPMENT (FOREM) 
-------------------------------------- 
-------------------------------- 
 
¶10.  A political pillar project implemented through FOREM was 
intended to strengthen democratic practices and electoral 
systems by conducting training sessions for local officials 
and voter education for the public.  The program did not meet 
expectations, as FOREM was unable to reach out to all 48 
wilayas (provinces) or engage a sufficient number of 
Algerians.  (One reason it moved slowly was its worry about 
hostile GoA reaction to its voter education efforts.)  MEPI 
Tunis, with our concurrence, decided to close out the program 
early.  In September, we repossessed four vehicles that were 
originally purchased for the project.  We are now working 
with MEPI Tunis and Washington to see if a suitable 
replacement project can be identified and funded with 
remaining project funds. 
 
CENTER FOR INFORMATION AND DOCUMENTATION OF WOMEN'S AND 
CHILDREN'S RIGHTS (CIDDEF) 
----------------------------------- ------------------------ 
--------------------- 
 
¶11.  This small grant provided support to CIDDEF's campaign 
to sensitize citizens to political party positions on women's 
issues, such as domestic violence, women's health and 
employment, in advance of the May 2007 legislative elections. 
 It covered the four wilayas of Algiers, Oran, Ghardaia and 
Annaba.  CIDDEF solicited the views of different parties 
using a custom-designed questionnaire and coordinated eight 
radio broadcasts featuring political party members discussing 
women's issues.  CIDDEF also held a press conference to 
highlight the outcomes of its program.  Finally, CIDDEF 
produced and distributed posters and flyers to educate 
citizens about party positions, with the goal of stimulating 
voter interest and participation in the elections.  The 
program achieved its goals and CIDDEF proved itself to be an 
effective local implementer that may be suitable for future 
cooperation. 
 
FORD