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President's Message

I am honored that the members of PGA's International Council have again elected me President of the Executive Committee for 1999- 2000. As PGA moves into its third decade of parliamentary activism, I would like to take this opportunity to look back at the progress we have made so far. As of March 1979, PGA (then Parliamentarians for World Order, PWO) had members from only seven parliaments. Today, through the commitment and work of PGA's parliamentary members and Secretariat, that number has risen to 1,300 members from 100 countries.

A phenomenal accomplishment of PGA during its first decade of activity was, of course, organizing the Six Nations Initiative which started on May 22, 1984 when the Presidents and Prime Ministers of Argentina, Greece, India, Mexico, Sweden and Tanzania announced a new effort to halt and reverse the nuclear arms race by issuing a joint declaration. This resulted in the creation of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) in 1996.

An exciting programme PGA has been involved with throughout its second decade has been the movement to create an International Criminal Court (ICC). From June 26-30, 1989, the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) held a Ministerial Conference on Peace and International Law in The Hague and asked PGA to help with the preparations. That same year, PGA member H.E. Arthur N.R. Robinson (then Prime Minister and current President of Trinidad and Tobago) reopened discussion in the UN regarding the ICC, placing it on the UN agenda.

PGA continued to work in this area with its Annual Forum in September 1991 entitled 'Global Dialogue on the New World Order'. In 1992, PGA sent two delegations to meet with world leaders from Argentina, Austria, Chile, Egypt, India, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago and Uruguay on the issue of the ICC. In 1995, PGA took an active role in opening a cooperative relationship with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. More recently of course, PGA's involvement in the creation of an ICC expanded to first co-sponsoring a workshop with the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago: 'Latin American/Caribbean Regional Workshop on Mechanisms for the Development of International Criminal Justice' (May 14-15, 1998), to then participating in the Diplomatic Conference in Rome (June 15-July 17, 1998) which concluded in the signing of a treaty to establish a permanent ICC. In the next phase of this process, PGA will embark on ratification of the treaty for the ICC to make what we have worked so long for become a reality.

In the 1990's, PGA pioneered parliamentarians' involvement in conflict prevention and management in countries such as Haiti, Togo and Burundi. PGA also mobilized consensus on key controversial issues at the global UN conferences of 1990-1996 (e.g. Rio Summit in 1992, ICPD in 1994, and the Beijing Conference on Women in 1995).

Another example of PGA's accomplished work lies in our pilot programme in West Africa, which has the objective of strengthening the parliamentary committees on population and development in Ghana and Senegal. The overarching goal of this program is to assist MPs in implementing the ICPD Plan of Action. Along the same lines, PGA is monitoring the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action by collecting, analyzing, and publishing Beijing-related initiatives undertaken by PGA members in their parliaments.

PGA recognizes that even after international agreements have been forged, it is crucial to monitor and enforce their implementation. For instance, PGA's immediate and strong response to the recent nuclear testing in South Asia indicates the important role of parliamentarians as a vigilant pressure on their governments to continue efforts towards realization of the CTBT and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NTB).

As President of Parliamentarians for Global Action, I will strive with the help of PGA's Executive Committee, International Committee and Secretariat to bring PGA into its third decade and the 21st Century with strength and purpose.

PGA's International President, Mr. Moses Kafiiuongua, MP (Namibia)