Breaking: Latest report received by Smart News Liberia has revealed that Liberia is left out of the 2023 MCC Compact Grant for 2023.
According to the report, the Board of the Millennium Challenge Corporation met on December 8, 2022, and selected seven African Countries, excluding Liberia, despite passing MCC Scorecard.
Senegal, The Gambia, Togo, Sierra Leone, Zambia, Mozambique, and the Ivory Coast have been named to benefit from the grants. It is not clear why Liberia which was amongst the Countries that passed their MCC Scorecards was left out.
Liberia had made a successful pass in the United States Government’s Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) scorecard, with a score of 12 out of 20.
The U.S. Government’s MCC released its fiscal year 2023 scorecards recently, which is a key component in the MCC’s annual competitive selection process that determines which countries will receive the agency’s development funds.
According to the MCC official website, a country is considered successful once it passes at least 10 of the 20 indicators, including the “Control of Corruption indicator” and, either the Civil “Liberties or Political Rights indicator.”
According to the 2023 MCC scorecard, Liberia passed 12 of the 20 indicators, including Controlling Inflation, Political Rights, Civil Liberties, Control of Corruption as well as Trade Policy, and the Rule of Law, among others.
Additionally, improvements were made in the areas of Freedom of Information, Gender in the Economy, Land Rights and Access, and Health Expenditures, including Access to Credit and Employment Opportunities.
Unlike the 2022 MCC scorecard, the country scored 100 percent in the area of Employment Opportunity, 54 percent in Control of Corruption, and Political Rights was 88 percent.
At the same time, Liberia scored 88 percent in Freedom of Information; Rule of Law is 54 percent, Gender in the Economy 77 percent, and Land Rights and Access 77 percent, while on Health expenditures, Liberia scored 64 percent and Access to Credit stands at 72 percent.
Despite the great success in the 2023 scorecards, Liberia was encouraged to do more in the areas of Fiscal Policy, Regulatory Quality, Government Effectiveness, Primary Education Expenditures, Natural Resource Protection, Immunization Rates, Girls’ Primary Education as well as Completion Rate, and Child Health.
To be considered for MCC funding, countries must first pass MCC’s scorecard, a collection of 20 independent, third-party indicators that measure a country’s policy performance in the areas of economic freedom, investing in its people, and ruling justly.
This is why it is shocking to hear that the MCC Board in its December 8 meeting, left Liberia out of countries to benefit from grants from the American Government.
