EU Presidency declaration on Equatorial Guinea

The European Union welcomes the forthcoming opening of the new Parliament of Equatorial Guinea after the holding of Parliamentary and Municipal elections last April 25th. The European Union believes that the process leading to the opening of the new Parliamentary session contains both positive and negative aspects which the new Government should consider in the future.

The European Union considers that the electoral campaign took place in a peaceful way and allowed political parties to carry out their activities in an atmosphere of relative normality. The European Union welcomes the government's decision to introduce the use of transparent ballot boxes. Nevertheless, the Spanish Parliamentary observers present in the country detected important irregularities that have distorted the electoral process in contradiction to the Agreements between the Government and the democratic opposition, reached in Mbini in August 2003.

Therefore, while recognising some steps forward in the process of transition to democracy, the European Union believes the elections failed to constitute a Parliament reflecting the political diversity of Equato-Guinean society, without adequate representation of the opposition in the elections.

The European Union wishes to welcome the participation of the opposition, which will be represented in the new Parliament only by two MPs, once they finally decided to accept the two seats allocated in the official results.

In this context, the European Union calls upon the Equato-Guinean authorities to allow this opposition to participate in the parliamentary sessions exercising their freedoms and rights and for them to be provided with the necessary material means. The EU also considers they should be granted free and substantive access to the public media, so they can inform the whole of the population about their activities.

The European Union hopes that the Parliament will be in a position to exert its monitoring role over the executive that it will contribute to implementing a programme of good economic governance, equitable distribution of the national wealth and sound and transparent management of oil revenues, in the furtherance of a sustainable development policy benefiting the whole Equato-Guinean population.

Finally, the European Union expresses its commitment to co-operate with the Government of Equatorial Guinea with the goal of promoting a transition to a full democracy within a framework of respect for fundamental rights and freedoms. The EU welcomes the letter from the Guinean government of 14 April, inviting the Commission to carry out a mission to Equatorial Guinea to discuss these issues. The signing of the National Indicative Programme for the 9th EDF is dependent on the willingness of the Guinean authorities to observe these principles in an internationally accepted manner.

The Candidate Countries Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey, the Countries of the Stabilisation and Association Process and potential candidates Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Serbia and Montenegro, and the EFTA countries Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway, members of the European Economic Area, align themselves with this declaration.

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