Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-01-16-Speech-3-258"
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"en.20080116.12.3-258"2
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Mr President, I will first quickly mention not the 30 million but the 40.6 million euros that constituted the payment, several months ago, of the second tranche of the 120-million-euro programme known as ‘Poverty Reduction Budget Support’.
We will fully support the African mediation and, of course, as the Council said, the Commission is available for a mediation mission. I made contact with Kofi Annan and had a long discussion with him. I told him we were available – including the High Representative – for mediation work. Clearly what is now hoped for is that it can primarily be African mediation. It seems to me that this is something we cannot lose sight of.
In closing, my last comment in answer to the question Mr Mulder asked, if the European Development Fund were budgetised, as Parliament and I are asking, budget support – for example the amount, technique, controls, verification and monitoring – would be done automatically, which would greatly simplify the procedure.
You cannot imagine how much easier and more efficient my life would be if I depended much more directly on Parliament’s choices, options and control over the use of my budget.
As things stand, I am afraid that this will unfortunately not be possible, but clearly this is a subject I would like to discuss. The question you ask proves once again that the budgetisation of the European Development Fund would be a considerable advance on the level of effectiveness of our support.
The payment decision had been delayed to await the results and recommendations of the third review of the PRBS programme by the International Monetary Fund.
These results have been known since early November and in November, on the basis of the International Monetary Fund’s favourable opinion, the Commission approved in principle the payment of a sum of 40.6 million euros by letter to the Kenyan Finance Minister.
However, taking account of the electoral context and the risk of the government using this payment for electioneering, the Commission decided, in consultation with the Member States, not to make the payment before the elections but after they had taken place, by the cut-off date of 31 December for financial commitments in accordance with the applicable procedures. That is why, technically, the payment was made on 28 December.
I understand the upset this is causing, but just to remind you, it was only from the evening of Friday 28 and Saturday 29 December that the irregularities started to appear, when the transmission of the results from the last 49 constituencies, out of a total of 210, were subject to abnormal delays and, as you know, it was only on Monday 1 January, on the basis of the weekend’s events, that the EU election observation mission reported in its preliminary analysis that the elections had not met international standards. Therefore, it was technically too late to prevent or block the payment of this sum of 40.6 million euros.
Secondly, I would like to mention – because it is important from the point of view of the argument – that I agree with many of the things that have been said, but that there are also things I do not agree with at all. When someone suggests that the technique or method of budget support is a method or technique on which there are no conditions or controls, that is obviously wrong. I would just like to draw attention to the fact that before we suddenly suspend budget support we should first check that the proposal, made by Mrs Kinnock and others, to convert budget support into project support, is feasible quickly, or as quickly as budget support allows, so as not to put the people in an even more catastrophic situation of deprivation. Indeed, it is easy to affirm principles, but we still need to make sure that the results and consequences of implementing them do not help to make the situation even worse.
That brings me to two thoughts on budget support. Budget support is controlled. There is evidence to be provided, and it is no less transparent than the project support system.
Of course, Mrs Kinnock and others, it goes without saying that if a settlement is not reached quickly between the parties to restore calm and, I hope, to agree on the possible organisation of new elections, as Mr Wittmann wishes, budget support, which to some extent qualifies the countries it is used for as meeting certain standards, certainly will not be able to be used any more and it will be necessary to find other means of providing support. However, I do not agree that we should just suspend development aid to Kenya. We always need to remember that behind this aid there are people who benefit from it. I wanted to clarify this and I believe it was important.
A last response, finally, to two other points. Do elections need to be organised straight away? I think it would be desirable for the parties to reach an agreement. We can express all the wishes in the world, but believing that elections will be organised immediately without agreement between the parties is unrealistic. Care also needs to be taken not to encourage situations to develop that make the people’s difficulty and misfortune even worse. This is something we should not lose sight of, and I think we need to act with great caution. I am in favour of elections, provided that they come out of a settlement."@en1
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