A public consultation was launched by the African Union Commission and the European Commission at the beginning of February in order to gather civil society recommendations on the joint EU-Africa Strategy to be approved at the planned second EU-Africa Summit in December 2007. The consultation moved to a second phase with the approval of an outline of the future joint Strategy on 15 May by the joint EU-Africa Ministerial Troika Meeting.
In the second phase, ECDPM will focus on sharing information on the official negotiations, on related events and positions of civil society representatives as well as provide some analysis on the progress of the negotiations. Contributions and position papers will be published, and shared with the officials and all interested actors. Please continue to send us documents and information that you would like to share: europafrica@ecdpm.org
This is the seventh issue of the Europafrica bulletin (click here for the previous issues), which will give you an up-date on the public consultation for a joint EU-Africa Strategy. The bulletin is issued 1-2 times per month. Subscribe by sending an e-mail to: europafrica@ecdpm.org
News
Facilitation of second phase
The Portuguese presidency has asked ECDPM to assist with the facilitation of the public consultation until the Summit. This enables us to continue to run the website and share information about the negotiations and different events taking place and, if requested by the various parties, to provide some advice on requests on how to link these various events as well as to facilitate the various debates between officials and CSO representatives. ECDPM will also provide an independent analysis on some of the core issues and participate in various brainstorming meetings in order to stimulate the official and public debates.
Strategy discussed in European Parliament
The European Parliament have started to draft a report on the EU-Africa Strategy. A first discussion took place at the Development Committee of the European Parliament on 16 July. Read more. The next discussion at the Development Committee will take place on 10 September for the report to be adopted by the Committee on 3rd October and by the Plenary in October.
Moreover, Joao Gomes Cravinho, Portuguese Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, current President-in-Office of the EU Development Council attended the European Parliament’s Development Committee on 18 July. Read more.
Civil Society Forum in Lisbon
The Civil Society Forum on the Euro-African Dialogue is the key event of the Portuguese NGDO’s project for the Portuguese Presidency of the European Union (EU). It will take place in Lisbon from the 15th to the 17th of November, gathering together civil society representatives from Africa and Europe with the main objective of working towards the construction of a strong shared vision on development for Africa. The Forum will serve as a basis for Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) to voice their main concerns and make recommendations on how to improve the Europe-Africa dialogue, with regards to both its strategic and more concrete dimensions. Read more here.
Read more about the Portuguese presidency and the NGDO platform here.
The official negotiations
The drafting process
Leading up to the Heads of states summit in December, several meetings will take place in order to prepare the Joint Strategy, the Action Plan and the Lisbon Declaration. A drafting committee meeting took place on 19-20 July, in Brussels. The Summit, the future joint Strategy and the contents of the Action Plan were among the things discussed. The next meeting is scheduled for 10-14 September in Brussels. For details of the other dates, please see the calendar. For information on which officials participate in the negotiations, see here.
The European Council ad hoc working group
An ad hoc working group was created in May in order for all Member States to closely follow the preparation of the EU-Africa Summit and of the new joint EU-Africa Strategy. It is scheduled to meet before each meeting of the drafting committee / experts negotiating the Strategy. The next meeting is scheduled for 5 September. Some time will be reserved on its agenda to carry out a first discussion on cross-cutting issues, such as the implementation and monitoring of the Strategy and the new institutional architecture. It will also include discussions on peace and security issues with some representatives of CSOs active in this sector.
For dates of the following meetings, please see the calendar.
The public consultation
Call for participants for Africa-Europe Youth Summit
If you wish to participate in the Africa-Europe Youth Summit that will take place in Lisbon 4-7 December please apply before 21 September to
nsc.africaeurope-youthsummit@coe.int
More information and application forms are available here.
Position papers
- The International Society for Poverty Elimination (ISPE), Nigeria, have submitted a contribution entitled: ‘Roadmap to Lisbon 2008:
Thoughts of Reinforcing Practical Win-Win Implementation of new EU-Africa Strategy’. Read more.
- A national youth consultation was held in Cameroon on 13 June. They brainstormed on what they could do to enhance the European Union – African Union Cooperation Strategy and have submitted the report; ‘EU – AU Strategy: A youth perspective’
Please send any papers or information you would like to share to: europafrica@ecdpm.org
Related events
Main events of the process are listed below. For more information, please look at the calendar section.
In August and October several regional youth consultations will take place in Africa. See the website of the North-South Centre for
more details.
10-14/9: Joint expert meeting on the EU-Africa Strategy
13/9: Conference “European Union-Africa Strategic Agenda” organised by IEEI / ECDPM (Lisbon, Portugal)
18/9: European Commission / World Bank meeting with civil society on Africa (Brussels, Belgium)
21-22/9: Informal Meeting of Ministers for Development (Madeira, Portugal)
22-25/10: Adoption of the European Parliament resolution on the joint Strategy in EP plenary
31/10: Joint Ministerial Troika Meeting (Accra, Ghana)
7-9/11: European Development Days (Lisbon)
7/11: ‘Priorities for Partnership and Action’: meeting of Parliamentarians from Europe and Africa (AWEPA and the North-South Centre; Lisbon, Portugal) (tbc)
15-17/11: Civil Society Forum on Euro-African Dialogue (Lisbon) (Note change of dates)
15-17/11: Euro-African Parliamentarian Forum organised by the North South Centre (Lisbon) (tbc)
30/11: Meeting between members of Pan African Parliament and European Parliament in Lisbon. The meeting should result in a joint declaration that will be presented by the two Presidents to the Heads of State at the Lisbon Summit (tbc).
4-7/12: EU-Africa Youth Summit (Lisbon)
8-9/12: EU-Africa Summit of Heads of States and Governments (Lisbon)
Please let us know of any events that you are planning, so we can put them in the calendar.
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