ACP/EU

Postcard from South Africa

4th ACP-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly in Cape Town, March 2002 - A personal view from John Bowis MEP

The sun shone in Cape Town and Table Mountain dominated the scene. The thirty minute boat trip to Robben Island reminded us how South Africa has been transformed. The Island, no longer a prison home to freedom fighters, is seen by them as a memorial, not to tyranny, but to man's indomitable spirit.

If Cape Town and its political change was the immediate backcloth to our debates and discussions, Zimbabwe provided the spectre at the feast. It was not a subject that could be avoided but a number of delegations were uncomfortable with the need to reach a conclusion in terms of resolutions. In the event, the Assembly voted by secret ballot to condemn both the electoral abuses and the arrest of Tsvangarai and his colleagues.

Tension too there was as we debated human rights in countries from Madagascar to Eritrea, Fiji to Cuba. As so often in such cases, the theme was sorrow rather than anger, with the ACP-EU family reaching out to encourage good governance. This after all is one of the key criteria under the Cotonou Agreement, the current version of the Lomé Convention.

The work of the Assembly went well beyond a geographical tour of good and poor democratic practice. It discussed a good report on democracy presented by the Rapporteur from Chad. It held workshops on Sustainable Development against the background of concurrent discussions in Monterrey and the recent EU Conference in Barcelona, on Migration and on Education, the last being peripatetic, as it visited local primary and high schools.

Trade, as ever, was a hot topic, with the usual references to and motions on crops, such as sugar and bananas and on the WTO. Without health though, there is no production and no trade and my own motion on health sought to raise the profile of health development and to support the mainstreaming of the needs of people living with disabilities, of the elderly and of children.

The Assembly had new Co-Presidents and saluted the work of the outgoing Co-Presidents, including our own John Corrie. The EU Co-Presidency continues in British hands, with Glenys Kinnock following John Corrie, who followed Henry Plumb. One big regret was the new Co-President, despite a certain domestic pull, was unable to persuade any of the European Commissioners to attend. The Spanish Minister did, however, come to represent the Council.