EU Lawmaker Urges African Govts To develop Sustainable Programmes For Migration

A member of the European Union Parliament, Mr Tomas Zdechovsky, has urged African governments to enhance cooperation and develop a concrete programme to access and effectively utilise funds for migration. Naija News Understands

Zdechovsky made the call on the sidelines of a plenary session on Migration at the Crans Montana Forum in Dakhla, Morocco.

Zdechovsky said that “excellent organisation from governments” was needed to handle funds made available by the EU for migration.He added that it was essential for local authorities to take ownership of migration policies by developing concrete projects to tackle the issue.

“We are prepared to increase our budget for African countries come 2020 but we need projects that are trustable.

“There have been a lot of programmes with corruption involved in many states, so what we need is one big concrete programme for Africa that will be managed by one of the African countries so that we can have concrete responses.

“We want Africans as partners and we want Africa to grow but not majorly through humanitarian funds or the funds we give; these should be a second option.”

He further called for the enhancement of the roles of regional economic commissions to promote avenues for development in the continent.Experts at the session also urged ECOWAS to take the lead in developing a strategic framework in tackling illegal migration in Africa.

They further urged African governments to make concerted efforts in managing the issues of migration and establish a regional body to address such issues.

Stakeholders at the session were drawn from various local and international government and non-government sectors.