Committee Program 2006, Minutes and Committee Annual Report: adoption

Meeting report

FOREIGN AFFAIRS PORTFOLIO COMMITTEE
07 March 2006
COMMITTEE PROGRAM 2006, MINUTES AND COMMITTEE ANNUAL REPORT: ADOPTION

Chairperson: Mr D Sithole (ANC)

Documents handed out:
Session Report: January to September 2005
Committee Minutes [please email [email protected]]

SUMMARY
The Committee decided not to adopt a large collection of minutes they had received just before the meeting. It agreed rather to do so at a later stage so that Members could have time to read through the minutes in order to identify any mistakes. The Committee also proposed that it received minutes on a more ongoing basis so that these minutes could be adopted more regularly.

The Chairperson requested that Members raise issues they felt needed to be addressed by the Committee in the upcoming year. These suggestions could then be combined to form a Committee Programme. Members suggested that problems in countries in the Middle East as well as African countries such as Cote D ‘ Ivoire, Sudan, Kenya, Zimbabwe and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) needed to be addressed. Alleged terrorists being unlawfully detained also needed to be dealt with, as well as South Africa’s relationship with Brazil and India. It was important that Committee Members were fully aware of problems that existed around the world so that they could also make positive proposals with regards to the way forward. It was important that this was done without encroaching on the work of the Department.

MINUTES
Discussion
The Chairperson highlighted that the Committee had a large collection of minutes to adopt. He felt that the Committee did not have the capacity, nor the time, to read through every page of the minutes at the meeting in order to adopt the collection.

He reminded the Committee that it had been proposed in the past that the Committee received minutes of previous meetings regularly so that these minutes could be adopted on an ongoing basis. This would enable Members to have the opportunity to read the minutes carefully in order to identify mistakes, rather than receiving a thick document that could only be skimmed through and then adopted. He suggested that the Committee once again condone this proposal and that the minutes then be adopted in order to stay on track.

Mr D Gibson (DA) supported the proposal that the Committee should receive minutes on a regular basis. He highlighted the fact that he had arrived in Cape Town that morning and had received the collection of minutes on his arrival. He had therefore not had the time to read through the minutes and he felt that it went against his better judgement to accept the minutes without having read through them.

Ms F Hajaig (ANC) stated that she had read the minutes and that there were many mistakes, especially the minutes of the most recent meeting. She therefore did not believe that the minutes should be adopted without being discussed by the Committee once everyone had had an opportunity to go through them.

Mr Gibson suggested that the Committee be given a chance to read through the minutes and that they then be discussed and adopted at a later date. He enquired whether this was the only collection of minutes the Committee would be required to read and adopt.

The Chairperson agreed with Mr Gibson’s proposals and enquired whether the rest of the Committee agreed to adopt the minutes at a later stage.

The Committee agreed with the proposal.

The Chairperson requested that Members forward ideas and issues they felt needed to be addressed by the Committee so that these could be combined to form a Committee Programme that could then be finalised. The ideas should include possible areas the Committee should visit. The Committee had planned in the previous year to visit Israel and Palestine. However, the Israeli Parliament was then dissolved so the Committee decided not to visit during this time of uncertainty. He felt that this idea needed to be resuscitated.

The Chair of Chairs had also requested that the Committee identify what implications the State of the Nation address had on its work. One of the factors that would affect the Committee was the new Budgetary allocations to the rest of Africa. The Chairperson wished to speak to the Chair of Chairs in order to get an idea of how this should be done.

He highlighted that the Committee was holding a closed meeting on 29 March 2006 and that more of these closed meetings might be requested in the future. The Department was planning to engage with Hamas soon and he felt that the Department should be asked to brief the Committee on what this engagement would entail. This meeting would also be closed and would most probably fall outside of the Committee Programme. The meeting on 29 March aimed to identify what the real situation was in Cote d’Ivoire. He insisted that the Minister meet with the Committee to discuss this situation as any other official from the Department could lead to limitations on the discussion. Members would be able to discuss the issue in confidence with the Minister.

Ms Hajaig felt that Israel and Palestine were not the only countries with problems in the Middle East. There was also the question of the destabilisation of Lebanon and the question of whether Iran should have the right to conduct nuclear energy research. Both these areas were extremely volatile and the Committee should also make time to discuss them.

Mr Gibson agreed with Ms Hajaig and stated that the Committee also need to pay attention to Brazil and India. Both countires directly affected South African trade. The Committee therefore needed to focus on South Africa’s relationship with both countries and should maybe visit them in the future.

Mr M Skosana (IFP) asked how the Committee dealt with information received from the Presidency. He felt that the Committee should receive a briefing from the Presidency as both dealt with the same issues. A recent workshop by the Department of Trade and Industry had looked at a number of important issues. Some of the issues were the African Renaissance as part of the countries foreign policy as well as companies in the rest of the continent. He felt it was important to identify whether the regulations South Africa used when dealing with these countries were similar to those relating to South African companies. A number of issues surrounding the Africa Diaspora also needed to be addressed by the Committee. He was pleased to see that the African Union had begun embarking on activities around this Diaspora. He suggested that National Intelligence also brief the Committee as intelligence played an important role in Foreign policy.

The Chairperson noted that a book on African business in the continent had been released. The Committee needed to get copies of this book so that Members would have a fair amount of knowledge when engaging with this business industry.

Dr A Luthuli (ANC) suggested that the Committee also turn its attention to the number of "hotspots" in Africa in order to gain an understanding of what is going on in these hotspots. Cote d’Ivoire was not the only African country with problems. Countries like Kenya and the DRC were also faced with a number of challenges. The Committee needed to look at these countries and determine how it was going to react to them.

Adv Z Madasa (ANC) felt that the Committee needed to follow up on the situation in Sudan as it was still largely unresolved and was extremely important to South Africa. One of the issues that needed to be addressed was the deployment of South African soldiers in Sudan.

Ms Hajaig agreed with Dr Luthuli and Adv Madasa. The Congo and the DRC were extremely important and needed to be studied. The Sudan was still a major problem area. She was also concerned about how frank the Committee should be with the Minister during the proposed closed meetings. She felt that the problems in Zimbabwe also needed to be looked at and she asked if the Committee would raise this with the Minister.

The Chairperson agreed with all the suggestions. He stated that a tentative Programme needed to be created from the issues that had been raised so that this Programme could serve as proof that a decision had been made by the Committee.

Mr M Ramgobin (ANC) understood that most of the problems that needed to be addressed were issues of conflict. However, he highlighted that the Department was also involved in a number of success stories around the world for example reconstruction in countries. It was important to determine how South Africa was going to identify its success story in its interventions in other countries. South Africa’s foreign policy options were largely determined by conduct from inside the country and it was also a living example around the world. He felt that the Committee needed to know what was happening in the problem areas in the rest of the world so that it could then suggest a way forward to the Department. He argued that many of the past Committee meetings discussed these problem areas but the issues were left hanging at the end and a way forward was never really proposed.

The Chairperson agreed that it was important that the Committee was briefed on all these issues so that it did not risk the situation where it was not briefed on a matter that it needed to address. However, it was also important that the Committee find a way to express themselves as parliamentarians and have opinions on certain issues while at the same time not encroaching on the role and the work done by the Department. As it was a new Committee it did not have the pleasure of relying on legislation. Its role was therefore shaped by the actual Members themselves who had to deal with situations creatively.

Mr Skosana noted that when the Department had met with Israel and Palestine had invited stakeholders to be observers in these meetings. He enquired whether the Chairperson would have the opportunity to be an observer in the meeting between the Department and Hamas. He enquire whether, if this were not the case, the Chairperson should not ask the Department for this status.

The Chairperson answered that this issue could be explored in the future.

Ms Hajaig stated that there had been coverage by the press of alleged terrorists being detained and posted in various prisons and detention camps in the United States and in Europe. These people were arrested and forced into detention camps and it seemed to be a serious human rights violation. She felt that it was important to try to convince the Minister or the Director General to follow up on this issue and maybe take action.

Mr Gibson agreed that this situation needed to be dealt with as no one seemed to know what was happening. He argued that these South Africans needed to be properly detained and subject to international laws of extradition.

Ms Hajaig argued that not only South Africans being detained should be addressed but also those being detained from other countries.

The Chairperson believed that this issue was being addressed by the European Union (EU) and that the Committee should therefore be briefed by the EU ambassador on the situation. The Committee could also be briefed by the Department of Intelligence and the Department of Foreign Affairs as well as Amnesty International in order to identify what action was taking place regarding this issue.

Ms Luthuli enquired whether there would be a debate in the future on what a terrorist was and what terrorism entailed. She believed that the Western nations would never really initiate this debate and it would therefore always remain a grey area.

The Chairperson replied that it was not an issue that would easily be resolved. For example, South Africa had in the past changed its legislation from the Anti-terror Act to the Protection of Democracy Act as it was still struggling with the definition. The Act also referred to "acts of terror" rather than "terrorism" as no acceptable definition existed. He believed that if the Committee attempted this debate it would get stuck in the same place the United Nations had become stuck when trying to create an acceptable definition.

Ms Hajaig enquired when public hearings and the debate on the Foreign Affairs Budget would take place.

The Chairperson answered that the Foreign Affairs Budget would be debated on 17 May 2006. Hearings with the Deputy Director General had been scheduled in March but would most probably be rescheduled to May so that it would be closer to this meeting.

Ms Hajaig enquired whether other institutions besides the Department would be invited to air their thoughts on the Foreign Affairs Budget before the debate in May.

The Chairperson replied that he did not feel this was necessary as he had asked someone to make a comparison of that and the previous year’s budget for the Committee. Often the budgets were not in sync and he had therefore asked someone to identify the problems that existed between the budgets. The Committee could then inform the Department of these problems once they had been identified. Institutions would mostly give political briefs and not the assessments which the Committee needed in order to make an informed decision on the budget.

The Chairperson enquired whether there were any more issues Members wished to raise.

Committee Members replied that there were none.

The meeting was adjourned.