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African Greens Second Congress Report
AFRICAN GREENS FEDERATION
REPORT FOR THE 2nd AFRICAN GREENS CONGRESS
28th -29th March, 2012, Dakar, Senegal
The African Greens Second Congress was held between 28th-29th March in Dakar, Senegal at Centre BCEAO. It was hosted by ‘Fédération Démocratique des Ecologistes du Sénégal (FEDES)’ and was done a few days before the third Global Greens Congress.
The official opening ceremony was moderated by Ms. Fadimata Bintou Touré, Mali Greens Leader, Mr.Ram Ouedraogo, Burkina Faso Greens Leader and Prof.Papa Meisa Dieng, AGF Secretary General and International Relations Secretary for FEDES.
We had welcoming remarks from Ms. Daniella Michel from Mauritius, Ms.Fatima Alaoui from Morocco, Dr.Idris Muslim, Chair, West African Greens Federation, Mr. EL Ali Haidar, Leader of Senegalese Greens (our host) and the opening remarks from AGF Chair, Mr. Frank Habineza.
After the opening ceremony, Mr. Frank Habineza presented the AGF progress report from April 2010-March 2012. This session was moderated by Ms.Anne Marie Bihirabake, Vice Chairperson, Burundi Greens/AGF Women Greens Coordinator and Prof.Papa Meisa, AGF Secretary General.
The report gave details on AGF’s recent history and the efforts undertaken to have a political federation after several years of hindrances. The Progress Report is attached.
After lunch break, the Chair presented the AGF’s three years planned activities from 2012-2014.
This Program is supported by Green Forum Sweden. It is a result of the AGF’s first Green Academy in Burkina Faso.
The day was concluded by the West African Greens ceremony that awarded several leaders for their contribution to the development of Green ideology in Africa. This session was moderated by, Dr. Muslim Idris, Leader, Nigerian Greens and Chair West African Greens Federation.
Those awarded are:
- Margaret Blakers, Australia
- Eva Goes, Sweden
- Papa Meisa Dieng, Senegal
- Adamou Garba, Niger
- Toussaint Hinvi, Benin
- Kossivi Addesou, Togo
- Jaye Allan, Australia
- Fadimata Bintou Touré, Mali
DAY TWO:
The second day had a tight program, since several items from day one had not been concluded.
We started with a presentation from Ms. Daniella Police Michel, one of the Leaders of Mauritius Greens on multilingual skills for AGF members. This session was moderated by Mr.Toussaint Hinvi, Leader, Benin Green Party and Mr. Addesou Kossivi, Togo Young Greens. Details about that presentation can be found on: http://lingalog.net/dokuwiki/
After that presentation, the Congress dealt with the issue of approving new members. Both Togo and Mozambique were approved as AGF full members while Gabon and Sierra Leone were maintained as Associate members. They were encouraged to finalize their registration process and afterwards apply again.
This session was chaired by Mr.Adamou Garba, Leader, Niger Green Party and Mr.Adama Sere, AGF 1st Vice President.
The next session was the ´Re-organising of African Young Greens Federation’, which was moderated by Mr.Kelvin Kaunda, Leader Zambia Greens/Young Greens Rep of AGF Committee and Ms.Nma Emeruwah, National Coordinator, Nigerian Greens.
They informed the congress that African Young Greens had re-organised and had elected Addesou Kosivi from Togo as their Chair and Teboho Mashota from South Africa was elected Financial Secretary while Mohamed ATTAFI from Tunisia became the Secretary.
The African Young Greens also elected four representatives to the Global Young Greens Steering Committee, these are: Rose Wachuka from Kenya, Michel Perlo from Senegal, Nassima Guettal from Algeria and Forget Chinomona from Zimbabwe.
It was proposed that all the six-sub regions recognised by AGF will vote their Regional Chairpersons, who will also automatically become Vice Presidents on the Continental Young Greens Committee.
All AGF member countries are obliged to embrace the Young Greens as the youth wing of their political parties and encourage girls/females to actively participate.
After coffee break, the congress started to deal with the items on day two agenda. The first item on agenda was the proposed amendments to the constitution. This session was moderated by Mr.Didace Pembe (MP), Congolese Greens Leader and Mr.Badono Daigou, Leader, Chad Greens.
We had only one amendment proposal from, Mr.Chales Lwanga Bbale, Chair, Ecological Party of Uganda, which called for the renewal of term limits for the executive committee from the one non-renewable 4 years term limit. After consulting the constitution it was agreed that there was no need to amend this article, since it mentioned, one term limit but renewable one. The proposal from Mali to edit the French text was not taken by the congress.
No amendments were accepted in the plenary, since the deadline for that was 20th March, however, we received a proposal from the moderators calling for putting into effect an article in the constitution establishing a commission of ethics.
This commission is the one in charge of monitoring and evaluation of all organizational structures and also approving new members.
It was agreed that members meet in their regional groupings and chose a candidate representing their region in this new commission as stipulated in the AGF constitution.
The Commission is composed of the following:
- President, Mr.Sylvio Michel ( Indian Ocean Island states)
- 1st Secretary, Mr.Joao Massango ( Southern Africa Region)
- 2nd Secretary, Mr.Napo Nissao ( Western Africa)
- Member, Mr.Zitouni Abdelkader ( Nothern Africa)
- Member, Ms.Phoebe Akinyi Nyawalo ( Eastern Africa)
It was noted that Central Africa was not able to nominate a representative since the two members who were present were already having another position. The region will nominate a representative in due-course.
After lunch break, we were pleased to have two special guests, Senator Bob Brown, Leader of Australian Greens and Senator Rachel Siewert, Australian Greens Whip. Both shared words of encouragement and members interacted with them. Thereafter, AGF chair handed them gifts and we had group photos together.
Senator Bob Brown, confirmed his continued support to African Greens and Rwandan Greens in particular. He promised to visit Kigali soon. This session was moderated by Ms. Robina Nanyunja, Vice President, Ecological Party of Uganda.
The next session was the updating of the African Greens Charter. It was moderated by Mr.Alexis Mugisha from Rwandan Greens and Ms.Tebogo Mashota from South African Greens. This session was brief since members agreed that any updates which will be adopted by the Global Greens Congress on the charter will be incorporated in the African Green Charter.
The next session was that of proposing and adopting African Resolutions to the Global Greens Congress.
This session was chaired by Mr.Adama Sere, Secretary General, Burkina Faso Greens and Mr.Patrick Sindane, Leader of South African Greens.
The following resolutions were adopted and submitted to the Global Greens Congress:
Resolution from Mali:
- Condemning the military coup-d’état that took place on 22 March 2012.
- Call for the protection and restoration of the national constitution of 25th February 1992
- Call for immediate and unconditional release of all political and military prisoners
- Call for respect of all civil liberties and the organisation of free and transparent elections.
Resolution from Mauritius:
- Call for the restitution of the Chagos Archipelago to Mauritius and the right of return of the Chagossians to their homeland.
- Call for the support to :
a) African and African Diaspora movements for reparations.
b) Verts-Fraternels party in their claim for compensation from France, Great Britain and Holland.
- Call for the support to ban the exportation from Mauritius and the utilisation of the "macaques a longue queue" for experiments in European and US laboratories.
Resolution from Morocco:
- Call against political discrimination of women in the Arab world
Resolution from Tunisia:
- Calls upon Global Greens to intervene effectively to bring about legalisation of Green Parties that have not been registered in their home countries.
Resolution from DRC:
- Call upon compensation for forestry destruction and other natural resources in the Congo Basin.
Resolution from Niger:
- Calls upon the implementation of transitional justice in order to achieve national reconciliation and get ensure democratic governance.
Resolution from Ivory Coast:
- Calls for a legally binding agreement against dumping of toxic wastes, especially mercury.
Resolution from Uganda:
- Encourage partnership and support between other parties and like-minded platforms
- Support Green Parties to grow democratically
- Call upon the Government of Uganda to allow people to express their liberties, such as the right to peaceful demonstration.
Resolution from Kenya:
- Condemn the use of Kenyan national resources in military spending in Somalia
- Provide preferential support to the people of Somalia
- Propose peaceful channels to end the Somalia conflict.
Resolution from Madagascar:
- Calls for the national elections to be held as soon as possible and end the transitional Government
- Support the candidature of the Green Party Leader.
Resolution from Senegal:
- Calls for cooperation between fishing and Green organisations.
The final session was that of receiving greetings from Observers:
- Representative for Greens from Sweden, Ms.Bodil Ceballos (MP). She was pleased to see that the green ideology is spreading throught Africa and retaliated Sweden’s support to African Greens.
- Representative of Green Forum-Sweden, Ms.Inger Schorling. She congratulated African Greens for this successful congress and promised continued collaboration. She noted maturity after the first congress in Kampala.
- Representative of Greens from USA, Mr.Bob Marsh. He was pleased to have been part of this congress and invited African Greens to the US Green Party Convention in July 2012.
- Observer from US Greens in California, Mr.Mike Feinsten. He was glad to have been part of this congress and re-confirmed that several websites for African Greens which he had purchased a few years ago still exist. He called upon members to take appropriate action before they expire.
- Representative of European Green Party, Mr.Juan Behrend. He was very pleased that the African Greens Federation has grown and really functioning, he congratulated all members for this success and promised close collaboration between EGP and AGF.
We finally had concluding remarks from the chair, who thanked all members for their patience and the successful completion of the congress program.
The 2nd AGF Congress was declared closed and all members were invited to join the opening ceremony for the 3rd Global Greens Congress.
