African Unification Front
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December 2006
SUMMARY REPORT ON THE SIXTH AFRICAN PARLIAMENTARY SESSION
The sixth ordinary session of the Pan-African Parliament took place in the third and fourth weeks of November 2006 at Johannesburg.
African Union president Getrude Mongella told the members of Parliament that the recommendations and the resolutions adopted by PAP as presented from the 10 permanent committees of PAP are a true representation of the voice of the African people on the continent.
The session was addressed by Nelson Mandela as he was launching the Pan-African Parliament Trust Fund during the opening plenary. The funds from the trust, which is chaired by Bwalya Chiti, will help strengthen the work of the permanent committees so as to make PAP an engine of economic development.
Some of the resolutions and recommendations adopted during the session include sending a fact finding mission to Cote d’Ivoire to assess the impact of the toxic wastes that were dumped in that country by a Russian Tanker. The incident resulted in the death of eight people and the hospitalising of 85 others.
A key resolution by the PAP affirmed that the African Union, not the United Nations, would take the leading role in the Darfur peace process, as well as in other peace initiatives in other affected areas in Africa.
During the session members of parliament called for an end to African Union’s ad-hoc election observer missions. They called for the establishment of a single permanent institution under the AU that will oversee electoral processes in Africa.
“I am tired of hearing of observer missions. Such missions in many occasions declare elections to have been free and fair but few hours after their announcements war erupts.” Hon. Sam Njuba from Uganda said.
He said AU must work towards instituting an organ that will have the mandate of supervising elections from the beginning and not observing at the end, adding that “Once any party (has a complaint) then it can take up the issue and delve into it.”
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