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George Maponga

Pan African Parliament (PAP) president Chief Fortune Charumbira is heading a delegation of the continental legislative body that is in Kenya to attend the fifth mid-year coordination meeting of the African Union that seeks to accentuate the drive to create a continental free trade area.

The PAP delegation will join representatives of regional economic communities and AU member states at the meeting that will be convened under the AU 2023 theme,” Acceleration of African Free Trade Area(AfCFTA) Implementation.”

Prior to the kick off meeting on Sunday, Chief Charumbira and his delegation will first attend the 43rd Ordinary Session of the Executive Council meeting which runs from tomorrow to Friday.

The meeting is expected, among other things, to consider a range of issues centred around economic integration as part of efforts to add gravitas to Africa’s economy and extricate millions of the continent’s citizens out of grinding poverty.

There has been a growing chorus for African countries to leverage their vast natural resources base, value add and get more returns to pivot the continent towards sustainable growth for the benefit of African people and achieve Agenda 2063 targets.

Looming large at the meeting will be the discussion and presentation on the status of continental integration in Africa in accordance with the Abuja Treaty.

Presentations on the status of regional integration and the draft report of the AU institutional reform will also feature.

Division of labour among AU member states, regional economic communities, regional mechanisms and the African Union will also be on the agenda.
The 10-year implementation plan of Agenda 2063 will also be presented at the meeting.

A statement from Chief Charumbira’s office said he will, before attending the meeting, join heads of AU organs for a strategic review workshop of the African Governance Architecture (AGA).

”As the operationalisation of AGA passes the 10-year mark, the  workshop is an opportune time to look back, take stock of the achievements and challenges that have faced African Governance Platform (AGP) and draw lessons to inform and influence the work of AGA over the next decade. Thus, the first statutory Meeting of AGP, which was held alongside the 36th Ordinary Session of the AU Assembly held from 13-14 February 2023 in the AU HQ Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, decided to convene a strategic reflection for the platform embers and stakeholders,” read the statement.

AGA was established in 2012 as a comprehensive, over-arching, consolidated and coordinated framework for addressing governance and governance-related opportunities, challenges, and structural causes of political instability and crisis in Africa.