Présentation

The new Partnership Agreement, the Samoa Agreement, between the European Union and the members of the Organisation of African, Caribbean, and Pacific States, the Samoa Agreement, includes a robust parliamentary dimension.

The text of the new Agreement states that the Joint Parliamentary Assembly (JPA) will be held once every year and provides for three Regional Parliamentary Assemblies (RPAs) for Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific.

The three new Regional Parliamentary Assemblies (RPAs) will have stand-alone meetings once a year, on rotation between the EU and the respective regions. An additional meeting of each RPA may be held at the margins of JPA plenary sessions.

The JPA shall be composed by Members of the three RPAs which in turn are composed by MPs from each of the regions and the European Parliament in equal numbers.

The OACPS countries are: Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Congo (Brazzaville), Congo (Kinshasa), Cook Islands, Cte d'Ivoire, Cuba (which does not send a delegate), Djibouti, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Fiji, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Grenada, Republic of Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Kenya, Kiribati, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Marshall Islands, Mauritania, Mauritius, Micronesia, Mozambique, Namibia, Nauru, Niger, Nigeria, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Rwanda, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Solomon Islands, Samoa, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Africa, Sudan, Suriname, Swaziland, Tanzania, Timor Leste, Togo, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tuvalu, Uganda, Vanuatu, Zambia, Zimbabwe

The new Rules of Procedure (RoP) consider a number of issues, including voting procedures, methods for systematic consultation and for scrutinising the implementation of the new Agreement, the structure of plenary meetings, standing committees, urgent resolutions, fact-finding missions, etc.

The new Rules foresee that both Houses are to 'strive towards gender parity' when nominating Bureau members and ensure 'that neither of the two houses nominates Members of one gender only'. The new RoP will make the Women's Forum, along with the Youth Forum standard features of each plenary session.

The aim is to make the JPA and the RPAs as effective, engaging and as visible as possible, and to allow swift and efficient work to underpin OACPS-EU cooperation. Decisions on meeting venues and frequencies under the Samoa Agreement will also take into account issues such as organisational efficiency and costs.