Executive summary
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- Article 25
- Article 27
Article 24
Article 25
Article 27The Council of Ministers shall establish the financial requirements of the Secretariat and establish the budget of the Secretariat. Adapted from : Georgetown Agreement as amended (2003) Article 24 lays down the powers and functions of the Secretary General. The post is highly dependent on instructions of the Council of Ministers and the Secretary General may only make proposals to the Committee of Ambassadors and present the budget to them in terms of Art 24 (2) and 24 (3). Beyond the President of Council, who is not daily involves with the ACP Group, there is no spokesman enabled for the ACP Group. Immediate reactions to relevant events are oft-times essential – confidence in the discretion and ability of the Secretary General of a genuine international organisation gives such a body credibility. If a body does not trust its elected office-bearers it runs the risk of forfeiting its relevance and visibility in the concert of nations. This Study recommends that the Secretary General be recognised as spokesman for the ACP Group under the aegis of the Troika. The ACP Secretariat has a Press Office; its freedom of action should be taken as a given and it should be the Secretary General who supervises the priority issues the Press Office addresses; it should not be shy about expressing opinions which do not clash with the culture of the ACP – this goes to the visibility of the ACP Group. On the occasion of the Declaration of Nadi in 2002, the President in Office was mandated to act on behalf of the ACP Group and, for the first time, made spokesman, on this occasion at the World Summit on Sustainable Development held in Sandton, South Africa. For occasions such as that there is no reason why the spokesman role cannot be interchangeable between the President in Office (Fiji), the President of Council and the Secretary General although it is clear that the Secretary General is more readily available for this essential action. To bring about action pursuant to the various directives of the Heads of State and Government without the lengthy filtering through the other organs, the Secretary General ought to have the powers to carry through the instructions in consultation with the Council of Ministers Bureau. It is recommended that the revisions proposed for the Georgetown Agreement be included for greater clarity and for the peace of mind of the Members and the Secretary General: TABLE 20: REVISION OF THE EXECUTIVE POWERS OF THE SECRETARY GENERAL “Article 4: There shall be a Secretariat of the ACP Group which shall be headed by a Secretary General whose powers and responsibilities are defined in Article 23.” “Article 23 (2): The Secretariat of the ACP Group shall be managed by a Secretary General vested with executive powers which will include:
Without such mandate, inertia occasioned by perceived constraints, risks white-anting the Group and the collective responsibility of the Council of Ministers will remain unused, and this could be dangerous in the light of the paradigm shift in world developments. The uneven results obtained from the unending exhortations of the various Declarations bear stark witness to a weakness in the system which will be repaired by the ACP Group charging an individual to take the initiatives listed above many of which were proposed by those interviewed. The Secretary General’s powers flow naturally from the formation of an international organisation in the true sense of the word – such an organisation cannot be run by a committee/council; only by personal application of someone chosen for “merit, qualifications and professional competence and integrity” (Article 25) in whom the whole organisation puts its trust to protect the collective and individual interests of Members. CHAPTER 6 (e): THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS AND THE COMMITTEE OF AMBASSADORS In practice, the Committee of Ambassadors plays the role of decision-maker, and even during a Council of Ministers meeting, the majority of delegates are actually ambassadors. The evidence is clear that the Council and its reflection, the Committee, have not been fully in a position to carry out the orders of the Heads of State and Government Summits – this gap needs to be filled and most Ambassadors recognise it. The two bodies must have sufficient faith to be able to mandate the Secretary General to act on their behalf and bring about the desired results which have so far not been achieved in any significant form, as seen in above. Committee Chairmen, as is well-known in management training, play a decisive role in the effective running of an organisation and nowhere is this more so than in the ACP Group. Rules of Procedure for the ACP Committee of Ambassadors, which also apply to the sub-committees and working groups, give great leeway to the Chairman to run an effective meeting89. Evidence given during this Study showed that these rules are not always properly applied and that the Ambassadors look forward to a more pro-active role by the Secretariat in assisting Ambassadors to make use of the rules. Many expressed the opinion that the institutional memory of senior members should, be used more positively to expedite matters so that Ambassadors with experience of the ACP should take a more frankly leading role. In 2002, the political committee of the Committee of Ambassador drew up papers which showed a boldness in confronting the political role the ACP Group now plays: there was a proposal that breaches of the fundamental terms of the Cotonou Agreement be first dealt with at the level of the Committee of Ambassadors so that the EU’s sanctions and withdrawal of aid could be pre-empted. This paper needs to be revived. With the suggestions that the ACP Group venture into new partnerships, the time has come for the Committee of Ambassadors to form a foreign relations sub-committee to help the Secretary General in prioritising and in follow-up. Policy decisions are laid down by the Heads of State and Government and the inability to apply this policy brings the risk of the folding of the Group, not by any unwillingness on the part of the Council of Ministers and the Committee of Ambassadors, but because the instruments put at their disposal do not match the demands of the evolving situation even with the streamlining implied by the introduction of a Bureau and the Troika. To confront the huge challenges of the global tidal wave striking the Group, rapid steps need to be taken to permit the Council of Ministers and the Committee to delegate powers to the Secretary General and/or the Troika to carry out the policy wishes of the Heads of State and Government. CHAPTER 6 (f): THE PRINCIPLE OF ROTATION According to Article 25 of the Georgetown Agreement, appointments in the ACP Group take place by the principle of rotation to ensure representativity in the staff component, and, although not specified elsewhere, the same principle is applied in the election of Chairmen and the appointment of the Bureau in terms of Article 12. This, in the organs other than the Secretariat, can (and according to evidence) does lead to anomalies. Where working groups, sub-committees and committees exist, it is recommended that the principle of rotation must give way to the rule of good sense so that the leading expert party can be elected from those whose material economic or other interests are exposed to risk. Such is the working of this principle, that for five years the ACP Group was in the embarrassing position of not appointing a Deputy-Director for the Centre for the Development of Enterprise: such rigidity should not be expected because of punctiliousness from an experienced international organisation. Praiseworthy as this principle may be, continuity is affected by the principle. The possibility of the prolongation of the office of an effective leader is undone by the short period of the Presidency. Greater flexibility should be brought into this rigid rule. Although rotation in the Presidency of Council holds the benefit of satisfying the appeal for solidarity, it does impede continuity. The President of Council scarcely has the time to make an impact on the activities of the ACP Group before he leaves his position – sure, the inclusion of the previous past and future Presidents does give the Minister concerned 18 months of participation in the Troika, this would hardly be enough to make an impression and stimulate the initiatives. It is hence recommended that the President of the Council be nominated for two years and that in the Troika there is therefore a six-year experience span. The following revisions to the Georgetown Agreement are proposed: TABLE 21: REVISION OF STIPULATIONS REGARDING ROTATION “Article 12 (3): The Bureau shall be composed of nine Members and its composition shall be as follows:
“Article 25 (5): The principle of rotation shall be applied where possible and desirable to all these appointments so as to ensure that account is taken of the need to ensure an equitable and balanced representation of the regions identified in Article 1 of this Agreement” Consensus is given as the decision-making process in the Council of Ministers, but exception can be made to this rule when decisions cannot be reached to reduce consensus to a voting majority four-fifths or two thirds (Articles 15 (2) and (3) Georgetown Agreement) so the consensus rule is not in fact absolutely rigid. At present, consensus is, on the face of it, taken seriously, and voting is perceived as divisive; but on examination, a silent vote is in fact taking place which never expresses itself in polling – so in the case of the revisions of the Cotonou Partnership Agreement in February 2005, many delegates did not accept the inclusion of the undertakings regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction as an essential element of the Agreement, nor did many accept the failure to provide specifics on the 10th EDF. (Mention can also be made of the delays in approving the statement on Togo which went through innumerable revisions.) Despite the protest, the revisions were accepted, or rather acquiesced in – the acquiescence in Economic Partnership Agreements appears to have gone the same route so that discontent could not be expressed through a vote. They were accepted for pragmatism in the face of a powerful negotiating partner, according to a participant90. Better would have been the process of voting so as to bring the opposition into the open. Consensus should therefore be qualified so as to allow the principle of voting to become commonplace and give the organisation credibility. At present, it only takes place in voting for the Secretary General. In this latter case, voting takes place by region: so as to provide for fair and equitable voting it is proposed that voting be introduced for decisions and that this takes place by region. Only where there is a majority in each of the six regions will a motion pass. As stated above, each Member should declare for participation in only one regional grouping and have its vote cast there. The revisions of the Georgetown Agreement on voting are as follows in Table 22: T “Article 1 (5): For the purposes of this Agreement, a Member shall elect on accession to the Agreement or on revision thereof to which geographic region the Member belongs, and this shall be registered by the Secretariat.” “Article 15 (2): In the event that consensus cannot be reached, Members of each of the six regions identified in Article 1 shall vote within their registered region on the motion. (3): A majority of two-thirds within each group shall carry the vote; (4): In the event of each of the regions obtaining a two-thirds majority, the motion will be considered to have carried; (5): In the event that voting in one or more region fails to obtain such a majority in the course of two meetings of a session of Council, the matter shall be postponed to the next session, at which the Council shall decide on the matter by a majority of two-thirds of its Members present and voting.” ABLE 22: REVISION OF VOTING RULES It is proposed that this system of voting be extrapolated into the committees and into the Committee of Ambassadors. CHAPTER 6 (h): POLITICAL DIMENSION AND RESPONSIBILITY The Cotonou Agreement is a political instrument. An awareness of the responsibilities inherent in it, just as the AU has adopted the Peer Review system, is exhibiting itself. The Committee of Ambassadors and the Council of Ministers wish to ensure that Members live up to the political standards that they have accepted in the Agreement and also in the Georgetown Agreement, and it is recommended that the proposal made in 2002 by the political committee of the Committee of Ambassadors be revived that steps be taken to bring a Member into line before the EU takes measures to censure a Member, thus pre-empting the EC’s sanctions and protecting the interests of the ACP Group. The reticence which has hitherto been demonstrated in censuring a Member or even applying the sanctions for non-payment of contributions is tending to change, something which depends on the strength of the chairman. The ACP Group has sent Observer missions to Sudan which brought out a very frank report, to the Central African Republic, to Guinea and sent an election-monitoring group to Togo. This has a double advantage – the boldness of action adds to the credibility and the visibility of the ACP Group and it brings into Africa the viewpoint and attitude of the Pacific and the Caribbean. This openness is encouraging and it is recommended it be exploited by the Press Office. CHAPTER 6 (i): FINANCIAL CAPACITY OF THE SECRETARIAT In all of the recommendations made in this Study, there has been a sensitivity as to whether additional resources need to be deployed for the actions recommended and, where possible, a source has been identified. But in the execution of its day-to-day tasks, the Secretariat and the Secretary General are frequently hampered by a lack of financial resources. One Member State government has offered its experts to help the Secretariat and Members and has held meetings and conferences at its expense: this capacity should be put to effect especially now that the Secretariat will need to follow the negotiating process of EPAs closely. The Policy Management Unit has arranged several capacity-building workshops and the WTO Joint Integrated Technical Assistance Programme is also a source of funding. The agency role that the Secretariat plays for the Agence Intergouvernementale de la Francophonie and the Commonwealth for expert negotiators can be expanded to offer similar services to donor agencies seeking umbrella control of programmes. In the links by the ACP Group which have been strongly proposed in this Study with like-minded countries (India, Brazil, South Africa) and with developed countries seeking an umbrella organisation as agent for the dispensing of programme funds, it is recommended the ACP Group lobby strongly to obtain both project and programme funds to manage and disburse on behalf of such programmes or donors and keep the offers of Members in mind. The ACP Group is the only existing North-South international organisation which can take on this task credibly and it can punt itself as a viable and valid partner therefor. Presently, Member States make a contribution to the budget of the Secretariat on the basis of GDP. If the Heads of State and Government are serious about the tasks they have set the Secretariat and the Secretary General, by implication, contributions need to be readjusted so that it can carry out its functions – suggestions have been made above including a very real one with regard to financing out of events, agency activity for donors, intellectual property the WIPO, but in the meantime, states will have to dig deeper and sponsors both ad hoc and long-term should be sought amongst the donor nations for projects in which donors seek a vehicle like the ACP Group to put them into effect. If the ACP Group looks beyond Cotonou, it needs now to seek to provide for future financial independence. The present sanctions rules, when applied strictly to non participation of meetings and the witholding of documents, have to a marked degree had a beneficial effect and Members have paid heed. But some disciplinary steps against defaulters are not taken. The President of the Council of Ministers will need to apply the rules of the Council strictly to ensure future compliance. CHAPTER 6 (j): THE ORGANIGRAM: STAGGERING OF APPOINTMENTS This Study has not been given the mandate to examine appointments or the personnel arrangements of the ACP Group, but since the efficacity of the Secretariat forms part of the terms of reference, a remark should be made about senior appointments. A vacuum has appeared in the filling of the Assistant Secretary General posts in the cases where an extension has not been granted: this leaves the Secretariat in an invidious position of not being able to fulfil its tasks because no-one responsible can make the decisions. It is proposed that in the future, senior appointments be staggered over time so the vacuum does not affect efficiency. In this Chapter, the whole gamut of the objectives of the Study are embedded in the recommendations for the improvements in the structures and institutions of the ACP Group. The main theme is the leadership role that has to be assumed. Without:
the goals the Summits have set viz: political independence, higher visibility, expansion of contact and enhancing relevance internationally, efficient protection of interests of Members also in the framework of the EU, better internal co-operation and confronting the global paradigm shift, will not be achieved. The recommendations below and the ACTION PLAN are proposed as a remedy to impediments to progress the ACP Group wishes to make. -o0o- RECOMMENDATIONS CHAPTER BY CHAPTER The recommendations are meant to address questions of principle and policy and references to micro-managed measures are included as emblematic: CHAPTER 2: HISTORICAL REVIEW Recommendation 1 (Urgent – visibility and independence) In order to follow up on the successful conference of Ministers of Culture and to celebrate the cultural intra-ACP links Caribbean-Africa, Madagascar-Pacific, Caribbean-African-Pacific-India, a study should be launched into the creation of an Event Division in the Secretariat also as a potential generator of income. CHAPTER 3 THE EU CORE BUSINESS Recommendation 2 (Long-term – efficiency, development and political) The positive results of absorption in 2003 and 2004 mark a real trend which it is recommended be exploited to ward off past political criticism and to defend the ACP Group’s position on budgetisation. Many NAOs perceive EC approval procedures to impede swift execution of policy – there are examples of the EC not responding towards their “partners” and not taking their common views and experience into account; it is recommended EC Delegates be invited to attend some of the sessions of meetings of NAO/RAOs as arranged by the Secretariat in each of the regions in September 2004; furthermore, help from NAOs of one State to NAOs of another ACP State can resolve complex problems – a college of NAOs can be formed without any additional resources being deployed. Political contact at the level of the Commissioner must be used now as a last resort to address the procedure difficulties after an audit of the difficulties experienced and workshops should continue for discussion of the Joint Annual Reports and Mid-Term Reviews. Yüklə 0,88 Mb. Dostları ilə paylaş:
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