11 September, 2025
The 13th Meeting of Human Resources Managers Training, West and Central Africa from 10th to 12th September 2025, Libreville, Gabon.
Dr Seedy Drammeh, the Deputy Director, Human Resources and Mr. Aurelien Innocent Ndeye, the Acting HR Manager, Development attended the 13th Meeting of Human Resources Managers Training, West and Central Africa from 10th to 12th September 2025 in Libreville, Gabon. The convergence brought together highly skilled Human Resources Specialists from across West and Central Africa. It was hosted by the Customs Administration of Gabon under the leadership of the Director General of Gabon Customs.
The theme of the three-day convergence was: Towards and Agile and Digital HR Function in Support of the Excellence of Customs Administration in West and Central Africa.
Amongst the topics deliberated by the experts were:
1. Evaluation of the implementation of recommendations from the 12th meeting in Banjul, The Gambia
2. Regional trends from the implementation of the Regional HR Strategies
3. Modernizing HR Management in Revenue or Customs Administrations in the digital era
4. Human Capital and digital transformation drivers of Revenue or Customs excellence (2025)
5. Practical Case: How to use Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools to optimize recruitment, talent management, evaluation and succession planning.
6. Tools to enhance skills through innovative and continuous training strategies
7. Tools to assess the impact of training activities (based on WCO tools with live cases)
8. Aligning HR with international standards of performance and quality (2025)
9. The role of Artificial Intelligence in managing ethics, risk, and governance in HR
10. Regional marketplace (regional Coaching programme), countries willing to share their experience
11. Presentation, review and validation of the draft recommendations from the 13th Meeting in Gabon.
Regarding sharing of country experience on Modernizing HR Management in Revenue or Customs Administrations, representatives from three countries, The Gambia, Nigeria and Togo were tasked to make presentations. The first to start was The Gambia, our presentation was on the Human Resources Automated Processes in the GRA:
Human Resources Information Systems (HRIS): We spoke about some of the features captured in the system like: Employees’ profile: Names, photos, email addresses, contact numbers, next of kin, qualifications, date of birth, date of appointment, confirmation date of appointment, gender, date of retirement, department, Unit & office posted.
Also, in the HRIS, there is information on key responsibilities and competencies, leave portal and performance management application etc. Another area discussed was the Performance Management System. Though we stated that the HR Working Group of the Gambia Revenue Authority developed a draft Performance Management Policy & Procedures, the GRA currently use performance Management in phases, and it is recommended that the steps below are implemented:
Each employee is expected to use the Leave and Competency Portal to set his/her performance objectives. Upon completion, sends the performance objectives to the Immediate Supervisor for review. The Immediate Supervisor is also expected to use the Leave and Competency Portal to review the performance objectives sent by the supervisee (s). After that, he or she is expected to invite the supervisee to discuss the performance objectives to reach an agreement. Upon agreement with the supervisee, he/she signs off.
The Head of Unit is expected to facilitate an agreement; in the event there is a disagreement in the setting of objectives between Other Staff and Head of Section or Services. The Head of Department is also expected to facilitate agreement; in the event there is a disagreement in the setting of objectives by the Head of Section and Head of Unit. Finally, the Commissioner General is expected to facilitate an agreement, in the event there is a disagreement in the setting of objectives between the Head of Unit and Head of Departments.
Also discussed was the Competency Database which has the competencies of the Staff, competency levels, and competency variances. We spoke about the competency assessment process to determine the competency levels of employees. Furthermore, we discussed the Succession Planning Processes from the identification of key positions, or roles within the Authority, to development of successor recommendation forms which are issued to Heads of Departments for them to nominate potential successors.
In conclusion, we made recommendations that Modernizing HR Management in digital era will enhance efficiency within Revenue or Customs Administrations. We thank Management, particularly the Commissioner General, for our nomination to attend this very useful training.