Africa's parliament at home in SA
17 September 2004
The Pan-African Parliament was officially launched at its new South African home on Thursday in a day of celebrations, prayers and expectations that the continental body would give new meaning to the African renaissance.
In his address at the opening of the body's second session at Gallagher Estate in Johannesburg, President Thabo Mbeki said the body should help Africa to criticise itself, and provide a space for Africans to forge a new collective identity.
The people of Africa, Mbeki said, would be "interested to know what this brand new institution will mean to them ... They want you, their elected representatives, to give them the possibility to control their institutions.
"They want you, their elected representatives, to help them to change their material conditions so that they escape from the jaws of poverty and their countries and continent from the clutches of underdevelopment ...
"They want you to help them to ensure
that their governments discharge their responsibilities to them, telling them no lies, respecting their obligation to be accountable to the people."
The parliament's second sitting - the first took place in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in March - runs until 7 October.
The president of the Pan African Parliament, Tanzania's Gertrude Mongella, said that the body would, over the next three weeks, focus on adopting rules and procedures, and conduct debates on the mission of the African Union (AU), the AU's peer review mechanism, and its socio-economic recovery blueprint, the New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad).
The parliament, Mongella said, was one of the AU's organs that would, over time, ensure the "full participation and integration" of the continent.
The Pan African Parliament is currently made up of five MPs from each of the 46 countries that have signed its protocols. The body will have 265 members once all 53 AU member states have joined.
The body will initially meet for two sessions a year, its major role being to provide oversight on issues of governance in member countries, and to foster a common approach to development on the continent.
The body will function as a consultative and advisory forum for the next five years, although it is envisaged that it will eventually pass legislation for the entire continent. It will also seek to harmonise the laws of AU member countries.
At the body's inaugural session in March, the parliamentarians elected Mongella as its president, supported by four vice-presidents.
South Africa's representatives to the parliament are National Assembly Speaker Baleka Mbete, National Council of Provinces Deputy Chairperson Johannes Mahlangu, Advocate Zweletu
Madasa, Sue Vos, and Fatima Hajaig.
The body is the second AU institution to be housed in South Africa after the Nepad secretariat, which is also based in Midrand, Johannesburg.
In terms of hosting agreements made with the AU, South Africa will host the body's venue and office, provide residential accommodation for the body's president, Gertrude Mongella, as well as transport for members and an information technology backbone for the institution.
South Africa, one of Africa's top five financial contributors to the AU, plans to build a permanent home for the parliament, possibly in Pretoria, while temporarily housing the body at Gallagher Estate for at least five years.
SouthAfrica.info reporter
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