Data Analysis · MDB Reform Monitor · March 2026
What the PEFA Data Shows About Africa: Schick’s Seven Core Indicators Across 46 Sub-Saharan African Assessments
Sub-Saharan Africa is home to the majority of the world’s extreme poor. It is also the region where the PEFA framework has been most intensively deployed. Across 46 assessments covering 32 African countries from 2016 to 2025, Schick’s seven foundational indicators — the controls that determine whether public money reaches schools, clinics, and the people who need it — tell a single story: broken, stuck, and in several cases getting worse. External audit, the accountability mechanism that makes every other control credible, scores 1.66 out of 4.0. Four in five African countries assessed score D or D+ on external audit. Payroll controls — determining whether teachers and nurses on the government payroll actually exist — are unchanged between first and most recent assessment in nine of thirteen countries with repeat data. Basic accounting is declining. The PEFA programme has been measuring this failure for twenty years. It has not changed its approach. This note asks why, and what should happen instead.
The Data
This analysis draws on the PEFA Secretariat’s published assessment database, restricted to Sub-Saharan African countries assessed under the 2016 framework. The dataset covers 46 country-level assessments across 32 SSA countries, with assessment years spanning 2016 to 2025. Thirteen of these countries appear in the dataset with two or more assessments, providing a direct trend comparison between first and most recent PEFA. Countries covered include all major SSA economies — Ethiopia, Nigeria, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Ghana, Cameroon, Zambia, Malawi, Rwanda, Senegal, Zimbabwe — as well as a wide range of fragile and lower-capacity states.
PEFA scores run from A (strongest, 4.0) to D (weakest, 1.0), with intermediate grades. The functional adequacy threshold — the minimum level at which an indicator can be said to support effective service delivery — is broadly C (2.0). Below C+ (2.5) on a core function indicator signals material risk. The analysis focuses on the seven indicators Allen Schick identified as the non-negotiable basics of functional public financial management: the complete cycle from budget credibility through accounting, cash management, payroll and procurement controls, data integrity, and external audit.
The Scorecard: Sub-Saharan Africa on the Schick 7
Scores on a 1–4 scale (D=1 to A=4). Bar width proportional to score out of 4. SSA only, n=46 assessments. Source: PEFA Secretariat database, 2016 framework.
External Audit: 80 Percent at D
PI-30 scores 1.66 in Sub-Saharan Africa — the lowest mean of any indicator in the framework across the region. Of 46 African countries assessed, 33 score D+ and 4 score D. That is 37 countries at D or D+. Eighty percent. Only 8 countries across the entire assessed SSA population score C or above on external audit, and just 2 reach B+ or above.
This is not a marginal finding. External audit is Schick’s seventh step — the mechanism that makes the other six accountable. A government that knows its supreme audit institution is underfunded, politically compromised, and structurally unable to table findings in parliament faces no credible deterrent against misappropriation. The IMF’s own IEO confirmed this logic when it documented that governance commitments attached to COVID emergency disbursements functioned as a checklist exercise — and part of the reason was precisely that the independent audit function in countries like Nigeria, Malawi, and South Africa was not in a position to provide genuine verification. The PEFA data makes the scale of that weakness visible: in four of every five African countries assessed, external audit is failing.
In the trend data, external audit in SSA is getting slightly worse — average change of −0.08 between first and most recent assessment across 13 repeat countries. Four countries declined. Seven showed zero change. Only two improved. Cameroon moved from D+ to C+ — the most notable gain. Tanzania improved modestly. But Sierra Leone, Mali, Madagascar, and Togo all declined. In every country where the score remained at D+ or D between assessments — Niger, Mauritania, Lesotho, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Zambia — years of PEFA-informed technical assistance produced no movement whatsoever on the indicator that matters most for accountability.
Basic Accounting: Declining
PI-29 — the timely production of comprehensive, accurate annual financial statements in cash basis — scores 2.05 in SSA. Forty-three percent of countries are at D or D+. In the repeat assessment data, basic accounting in Africa is declining: the average change between first and most recent assessment is −0.12. Four countries declined, seven showed no change, only two improved. Zambia fell from C+ to B+ to C+ — net decline of 1.0. Uganda fell from B+ to C+ — decline of 1.0. Cameroon fell from C to D+. Mauritania fell from C to D+.
This is the indicator Schick placed second in his sequencing — the foundational prerequisite for cash management, procurement oversight, and data integrity. You cannot manage cash you have not first recorded. You cannot audit expenditure that has not been accounted for. The drive toward IPSAS accrual accounting — promoted in AFRITAC East and in the PEFA Secretariat’s own advanced-country work — requires sophisticated judgements about asset depreciation, contingent liabilities, and actuarial estimates. These are meaningless without reliable underlying transaction records. In the majority of assessed African countries, those records are late, incomplete, or of insufficient quality to provide a reliable basis for government decision-making. The platform for advanced reform is not there.
Payroll Controls: Frozen
Payroll controls (PI-23) score 2.01 in SSA. The median score is 1.5 — meaning more than half of assessed African countries are at D+ or below on the indicator that governs whether the wage bill — which consumes between 50 and 70 percent of total government expenditure in most SSA countries — is being paid to people who exist, are working, and are entitled to what they receive. Ghost workers are not a metaphor. They are the documented operational reality in a majority of assessed African states, sustained by the same structural absence of physical verification that the PEFA framework has been recording for two decades.
The trend data shows payroll controls essentially frozen. Of 13 SSA countries with repeat assessments, 9 showed zero change between first and most recent PEFA. The score was identical — not marginally different, identical. In Cameroon, Niger, Mauritania, Madagascar, Togo: D+ in the first assessment, D+ in the most recent. Two countries declined. Only two improved — Lesotho by half a grade, Sierra Leone by a full two grades, reflecting an intensive post-Ebola institutional rebuilding effort that is the exception rather than the rule.
Procurement: Backsliding
Procurement management (PI-24) scores 2.14 in SSA — 41 percent of countries at D or D+. The trend in Africa is negative: average change of −0.08 between assessments, with 5 countries declining, 4 flat, and 4 improving. The most striking case is Kenya: a score of B+ (3.5) in the 2019 assessment, collapsing to D+ (1.5) in the 2023 assessment — a decline of two full letter grades. This is the country where the KEMSA procurement scandal, documented in the separate IMF COVID emergency financing analysis on this site, was unfolding in real time. The PEFA picked it up. The IMF’s COVID emergency financing framework, which disbursed $739 million to Kenya in April 2020, did not.
Procurement is the primary channel through which public funds are diverted in SSA — whether through over-invoicing, inflated contract values, fictitious suppliers, or emergency pretext procurement that bypasses competitive tender requirements. The data shows that this channel remains wide open in the majority of assessed African countries, and that the trend is in the wrong direction.
The Form-Function Gap in Africa
The contrast between where African countries perform well and where they fail structurally is the most direct illustration of the isomorphic mimicry problem — the adoption of the form of modern governance without the functional capacity that would make it operational.
Table 1. Schick 7 vs. Higher-Scoring Indicators — Sub-Saharan Africa. Source: PEFA Secretariat database, n=46 assessments, 2016 framework.
| Indicator | SSA Mean | % at D/D+ | What It Measures |
|---|---|---|---|
| PI-17: Budget Preparation Process | 2.67 | 26% | Annual budget preparation calendar and guidelines — form |
| PI-18: Legislative Scrutiny of Budgets | 2.65 | 22% | Parliament reviews the budget — process |
| PI-13: Debt Management | 2.65 | 30% | Debt records and reporting — documentation |
| PI-25: Tax Revenue Administration | 2.58 | 20% | Revenue collection framework — form |
| PI-04: Budget Classification | 2.48 | 7% | Chart of accounts — structural |
| — SCHICK FOUNDATIONAL THRESHOLD — | |||
| PI-01: Budget Reliability | 2.30 | 37% | Does the approved budget actually get executed? |
| PI-21: Cash Management | 2.42 | 13% | Do funds reach service delivery predictably? |
| PI-24: Procurement | 2.14 | 41% | Are contracts awarded without leakage? |
| PI-27: Financial Data Integrity | 2.09 | 48% | Are bank accounts reconciled and records reliable? |
| PI-29: Basic Accounting | 2.05 | 43% | Are timely cash-basis statements produced? |
| PI-23: Payroll Controls | 2.01 | 59% | Are the people on the payroll real and working? |
| PI-30: External Audit | 1.66 | 80% | Is there any independent accountability at all? |
The budget preparation calendar (PI-17, mean 2.67) scores a full letter grade above external audit (PI-30, mean 1.66). Parliament reviews the budget (PI-18, 2.65); it just never acts on audit findings, because the audit findings arrive late, incomplete, or not at all. The chart of accounts (PI-04) scores 2.48 — almost no African country is at D on budget classification. The accounts are classified correctly. They just don’t reconcile (PI-27, 2.09) and the statements aren’t produced on time (PI-29, 2.05) and there’s nobody independent checking them (PI-30, 1.66).
This is isomorphic mimicry made precise. The form of modern PFM is present in most assessed African countries — the budget calendar, the chart of accounts, the debt reporting framework, the tax administration structure. The function — the controls that determine whether public money actually reaches a school rather than a ghost consultant’s bank account — is failing in the majority of them. The PEFA framework measures both, in the same assessment, on the same 31-indicator scorecard. The divergence between the form scores and the function scores in this data is the most direct empirical evidence available for the proposition that African PFM reform has been going in the wrong direction for two decades.
The Trend Summary
Table 2. Schick 7 Trend Analysis — 13 SSA Countries with Repeat Assessments. Source: PEFA Secretariat database, 2016 framework.
| Indicator | Avg Change (SSA) | Improved | Flat | Declined | Direction |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PI-21 Cash Management | +0.31 | 7 | 4 | 2 | ↑ Improving |
| PI-01 Budget Reliability | +0.31 | 5 | 4 | 4 | → Mixed |
| PI-27 Financial Data Integrity | +0.23 | 7 | 3 | 3 | → Mixed |
| PI-23 Payroll Controls | +0.04 | 2 | 9 | 2 | → Frozen |
| PI-24 Procurement | −0.08 | 4 | 4 | 5 | ↓ Backsliding |
| PI-29 Basic Accounting | −0.12 | 2 | 7 | 4 | ↓ Declining |
| PI-30 External Audit | −0.08 | 2 | 7 | 4 | ↓ Declining |
Cash management (PI-21) is the one indicator showing consistent improvement in Africa — average gain of +0.31 between assessments, seven countries improving. This is the Treasury Single Account effect: where political will has aligned with technical support at the right moment — the Kaduna model in Nigeria, Togo’s leap from D+ to B+ between 2016 and 2023 — genuine functional improvement is possible. The lesson the PEFA data teaches is not that nothing works. It is that the things that work are the unglamorous basics — TSA implementation, cash forecasting, warrant release mechanisms — and they work when they are sequenced correctly and resourced properly. Togo improved by 2.0 on PI-21 between assessments. That is as large a gain as IPSAS accrual accounting generates noise and conference attendance without moving any needle.
The three indicators declining are basic accounting, external audit, and procurement. These are the three controls most directly associated with accountability for where public money actually goes. They are declining in Africa while the Secretariat expands its climate PFM portfolio and its gender-responsive budgeting modules. The sequencing is wrong, the priorities are wrong, and the data — the Secretariat’s own data — says so plainly.
What Needs to Change
The PEFA framework was designed to produce exactly this kind of evidence. It has done its job. What it was not designed to do — and what its governing board and secretariat have failed to do — is use the evidence to reorder priorities. The framework has drifted toward serving the reporting needs of bilateral donors who fund esoteric PFM reform, and away from the accountability function it was created to fulfil.
The reform argument is simple. No PEFA-informed technical assistance programme in Sub-Saharan Africa should be delivering work on accrual accounting, climate budget tagging, programme-based budgeting, or gender-responsive frameworks in any country that scores below C on all seven of Schick’s foundational indicators. The sequencing must be enforced — not as a bureaucratic rule, but as an expression of the most basic logic: you cannot build advanced governance on a foundation that the PEFA’s own data shows is broken. Fix the external audit. Fix the payroll. Fix the basic accounting. The data shows what is broken. The question is whether the institutions that commissioned the data have the institutional courage to act on it.