Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-10-24-Speech-3-352"
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"en.20071024.40.3-352"2
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"Madam President, I would like to thank our rapporteur for her sound and comprehensive report. There is a broad consensus on the general principles here in the House. The EU-Africa Summit in Lisbon in December cannot come too soon. I welcome the fact that we will be agreeing a joint strategy.
The European Parliament’s position on the special case of Mr Mugabe has been known for years. However, this gentleman must not become a stumbling block to a new chapter in European-African relations. I believe there are enough European heads of government who have a clear and unequivocal message for that gentleman. That is why he needs to be present and endure the message that will be delivered.
As Chairman of the delegation for relations with the Pan-African Parliament, may I express some specific parliamentary wishes for the future cooperation which we agreed last week in Midrand. Africa’s parliaments have tended to be neglected institutions. They have an important constitutional role on paper but their own governments and, indeed, donors tend not to take them very seriously. Yet with proper resources and after successful and comprehensive capacity-building for Members and staff in the parliamentary administrations, committees and groups, these parliaments have the potential to perform their true role of exercising proper political scrutiny of the executive. The irresistible appeal of this scenario is also that we would thus have scrutinising bodies at local level with democratic legitimacy, and when problems arise, their criticisms would be more likely to be accepted than those of foreign donors.
I therefore urge the Commission to incorporate parliamentary capacity-building on a targeted basis into its country programmes, so that in a few years time, we can genuinely see that African politics have become much more responsive, in practice, to the public’s needs, also thanks to the involvement of the national parliaments."@en1
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