Local Electricity Access Programme
LEAP Transparency - Intro English
Welcome to LEAP
Bringing electricity to everyone is a challenging task.
LEAP can make this easier with regular dialogue between all players in the electricity sector.
I salute the Senegalese Government, business and civil society for jointly driving LEAP. My vision is to see LEAP prosper in Senegal and across Africa. Multi-stakeholder dialogue already works well at Transparency International, the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), and the Fisheries Transparency Initiative (FiTI), which I am proud to have co-founded and chaired.”
“LEAP is based on a simple idea: talk and listen to each other.”
Why LEAP?
LEAP Transparency is a local electricity access programme that aims to pilot a participatory governance framework for local electrification in Senegal and around the world.
Electrification in Africa is seeing a surge in community-based off-grid solutions. Yet, local electrification is often underfunded and fails to meet the requirements of communities.
While electrification projects sometimes assess consumer needs at inception, they often lose touch. Many suffer from a lack of communication, mutual understanding, and trust between the various interest groups, leading to misunderstandings, disenfranchisement, and conflict. As a result, many projects become unsustainable and experience difficulties to recover costs.
Setting up an electric installation is only one cornerstone. It is necessary to create an enabling environment, which offers investors suitable assurances for long-term reliability, transparency and benefits from the projects, while meeting the needs of the local population. All actors should be connected and aligned from the planning phase and along the lifespan of the project and be informed and prepared to play their roles.
LEAP in a nutshell
LEAP uses a novel approach that brings together the government, business and civil society sector in a structured and lasting dialogue about fair and lasting access to energy that ultimately leads to sustainable electrification and local development.
LEAP is designed to offer government, business and civil society organisations (CSOs) a platform to jointly create an enabling environment for local electrification that meets the real needs of communities, while offering a stable framework for energy investors.
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How LEAP works
The LEAP approach is unique in that it systematically institutionalises multi-stakeholder groups (MSGs) at three levels to manage and improve electrification, following the good examples of the EITI. The three levels interact in an inclusive multi-stakeholder ecosystem: Regular dialogue at eye level ensures expectations are managed, issues are flagged and trust is built. This way LEAP can help find local solutions to local problems as they arise over the life span of the project and address the wider national reform issues as well.
LEAP International
The LEAP International Advisory Group
An International Advisory Group chaired by Transparency International founder Prof Peter Eigen draws on the Senegal experience to develop an international governance standard for rural electrification, to prepare for a scaled expansion of LEAP across Senegal and Africa.
- Prof. Peter Eigen - LEAP Chair
- Abdoulaye Ba
- Prof. Eicke Weber
- Prof. Gunnar Graef
- Gabriele Schwarz
- Kerstin Schönherr
- Maximilian Jarrett
- Timon Herzog
The LEAP Secretariat
With offices in Berlin and Dakar, the LEAP Secretariat is responsible for the functioning of the national and Commune MSGs.
Tim Bittiger
Head of LEAP Secretariat
Aïcha Kante
Assistant Dakar Office/LEAP Secretariat
Ahmet Gueye
Coordinator Dakar Office/LEAP Secretariat
