Ethiopia Doubles Its African Union Bill Just as Washington Steps Back

ETHIOPIA · GEOPOLITICS

The Ethiopia African Union contribution will rise to about US$15 million a year from 2027, nearly double its current assessment, as the country moves into the bloc’s top funding tier. The increase lands exactly as American support for the AU’s Somalia mission is due to end.

What the Ethiopia African Union contribution change involves

The change was announced at the 49th Ordinary Session of the African Union (AU) Executive Council in Addis Ababa. Ethiopia has voluntarily moved from Tier Two to Tier One under the bloc’s scale of assessment — the formula that divides the budget among member states roughly according to the size of their economies.

Its assessed regular contribution was close to US$8 million at the end of 2025 and had been paid in full, according to AU documents reviewed by The Reporter Ethiopia. The new figure, about US$15 million a year from 2027, is roughly double that.

Tier One is a small club. It now includes Algeria, Egypt, Nigeria, South Africa, Morocco, Angola and Ethiopia, and together those states account for about 45.15% of assessed contributions to the regular budget and the Peace Fund — a pool of roughly US$600 million to US$650 million a year.

The money buys no additional influence in the formal sense. Tier One members have the same vote as everyone else.

Why the AU needs it

The organisation has spent years trying to reduce its dependence on outside donors, with limited success. It says its financing remains unpredictable and donor-dependent, while more than 40% of member states do not consistently pay their annual obligations.

Arrears compound the problem. Figures reported by The Reporter Ethiopia show Sudan with accumulated unpaid assessments of about US$74 million, and Libya, South Sudan, Burkina Faso, Mali, Guinea and Niger together accounting for more than US$30 million in additional arrears.

External support has also fallen short. Development partners contributed about US$288.6 million in 2024 against roughly US$404 million the AU had expected.

The self-financing plan that half worked

In 2016, African leaders meeting in Kigali backed a financing mechanism based on a 0.2% levy on eligible imports, with flexibility to use other domestic sources instead. The aim was to fund the whole operational budget, three-quarters of the programme budget and a quarter of the Peace Fund.

Implementation has been uneven. Around 20 member states have introduced legal or customs measures connected to the mechanism, and about 17 have fully operationalised it or actively remit through the levy.

Several of the largest economies have stayed out. South Africa, Nigeria, Algeria and Egypt have not adopted the dedicated import levy, partly because of World Trade Organization and regional trade-agreement concerns, and meet their obligations from general revenue instead.

Somalia is where the arithmetic bites

On 1 July the United States notified the AU that it would not provide funding for the AU Support and Stabilisation Mission in Somalia (AUSSOM) beyond 31 December 2026, according to the Institute for Security Studies. AUSSOM relies on US funds channelled through the UN Support Office in Somalia (UNSOS) to cover its logistics costs. Washington has pointed to the pace at which Somali authorities are assuming responsibility for national security, and said it would not use its veto to block renewal of the mission’s mandate — but would block any UN logistical or operational support beyond that date.

The US has also opposed applying the UN Security Council’s Resolution 2719 framework to the mission. That framework, adopted in December 2023, allows qualifying AU-led and UN-authorised peace operations to draw up to 75% of their financing from UN-assessed contributions, with the AU covering the rest. Washington said in December 2024 that “the conditions have not been met” for applying it in Somalia, citing financing, accountability, human rights standards and operational oversight.

AUSSOM starts from a weak position. It inherited about US$94 million in unpaid obligations to troop-contributing countries from its predecessor mission, and the AU is responsible for sustaining more than 11,000 uniformed personnel — the UN Security Council authorises up to 11,826, including 680 police.

The logistical support at stake has been valued at more than half a billion dollars. Replacing it from African budgets alone is not a small ask.

Where the AU’s own money goes

The organisation’s audited financial report for 2024 shows staff salaries and benefits as the largest expenditure category, followed by peace support operations. It spent about US$169 million on staff-related costs and roughly US$143 million on peace operations, according to The Reporter Ethiopia’s reading of the report.

Reported remuneration stood at about US$361,000 for the AU Commission chairperson and US$287,000 for the deputy chairperson. Accounts payable totalled around US$283 million, with close to half reportedly owed to troop-contributing countries.

Those figures are the backdrop to every conversation about member-state contributions. Ethiopia’s increase is real money, but it is a fraction of what the Somalia mission alone requires.

This report is based on The Reporter Ethiopia’s coverage of 29 August 2026, corroborated by the Institute for Security Studies, Kulu Media and the US Mission to the United Nations.

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