The Bulletin of Fridays of the Commission - Making EU-Africa Relations Future-Proof
Authors
- Geert Laporte
- Dr. René N’Guettia Kouassi
- Prof. Michelo Hansungule
From April 2000 Europe and Africa realised that there was need to review their cooperation in order to integrate emerging challenges arising from globalisation. The new dialogue which started in Cairo led to the subsequent adoption of a new cooperation framework in 2007, namely, the Joint Africa- EU Strategy (JAES), which is intended to be an overarching framework of cooperation between the two continents.
The inception of the JAES was a bold and ambitious undertaking, but nonetheless, consolidated Africa-EU relations and emphasised the strategic imperative of transforming the relationship through a common vision, goals, objectives, and the implementation of the joint strategy within a strengthened political dialogue that ought to reflect a partnership of equals.
The JAES, taken as complementary support to Africa’s efforts to attaining its development and integration objectives, has opened up new avenues and opportunities for collective action for Africa and Europe’s common vision.
As H.E. Mr Erastus Mwencha says, the 4th Africa-EU Summit of 2014 was yet another opportunity for the two partners to take the necessary steps to implement the key priorities adopted by the summit to bring Africans and Europeans much closer together for the prosperity and peace of our peoples. We welcome the summit endorsement of a wide range of financing instruments and policy initiatives to implement the agreed priorities, most especially the EU’s commitment to provide more than €28 billion in addition to financial support through bilateral cooperation. I am more than confident that in the spirit of co-responsibility and ownership, Africa is also committed to the partnership, and will find ways to generate resources to co-finance the partnership.
This edition of Fridays of the Commission preceded the 4th Africa-EU Summit, and is a forum for Africa, its partners and stakeholders to share in the discussions on current social, political and economic matters. The relevance of this initiative can be seen by the success of this special session of the Fridays of the Commission organised by the AUC Department of Economic Affairs in collaboration with the European Centre for Development Policy Management (ECDPM) and JAES Support Mechanism on 28 February 2014 on the theme of “Making Africa-EU Relations Future-Proof”.
This Bulletin contains contributions from the participants - Dr Rene N’Guettia Kouassi, ECDPM's Geert Laporte, Jack R. Mangala, Maurice Enguéléguélé, Dr. Kerstin Carlson, Prof Alioune Fall, Dr. Barney Afako, Prof Michelo Hansungele, Joseph Chilengi and Amb. John Kayode Shinkaiye.
