African civil society groups call for campaign against EU agenda
African civil society groups call for campaign against EU agendaBy Kabanda Chulu
Wednesday February 27, 2008 [03:00]
CIVIL Society Organisations in Africa have called for a campaign against Europe’s aggressive economic agenda in Africa. According to the declaration of civil society organisations which met last week in Cape Town, South Africa, any trade negotiations with the European Union must be based on African countries’ development agenda that was based on national priorities.
“We demand that there must be no negotiations on services, investment, intellectual property, competition, government procurement and any other new issues in order to ensure that all sovereignty on these matters is retained at the national and regional levels,” they stated.
“And there must be a return to our own development agendas based on national priorities within consolidated regional communities and any trade relationship between Africa and Europe must be based on our development agenda with the right to protect our domestic and regional markets and our economic sovereignty.”
The civil society organisations also demanded that the interim agreements signed in December 2007 must be reversed because the agreements were nothing less than re-colonisation.
“It is clear more than ever that the interim Economic Partnership Agreements are Europe’s means of locking-in the fundamentally unequal relationships between Africa and Europe and this is nothing less than re-colonisation,” they stated.
“And we call on governments to work together in order to reverse the interim arrangements and we commit ourselves to work with our governments in the quest to achieve more equitable relationships with Europe that protect our sovereignty and autonomous developmental options.”
Several civil society organisations from across Africa that mainly advocate on issues of development economics and trade met last week in Cape Town, under the auspices of the African Trade Network and the Economic Justice Forum of South Africa.
The objective of the meeting was to review the stop economic partnership agreement (EPAs) campaigns in view of the December 2008 deadline. Zambia was represented by Civil Society for Trade Network coordinator Saviour Mwambwa and PELUM Association Zambia programme officer Anne Maine.
Labels: CIVIL SOCIETY, EU
posted by MrK @ 6:03 AM
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