23rd February 2006

Power belongs to the people, but not in Uganda

JOSEPHINE OSIKENA, Director of Democracy and Development at the Foreign Policy Centre, today said:

"The wave of Ugandan elections will be anything but free and fair. Why should they be? Regrettably, President Yoweri Museveni appears to have lost all respect for the ballot box and, for the most part, the election results have been predetermined. Voters have either been scared off by violence and intimidation or they have become completely apathetic."

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16th January 2006

STEPHEN TWIGG, Director of the Foreign Policy Centre today said:

"Libya, not Iraq is the model for dealing with Iran, and bringing about a solution to the country's nuclear ambitions.

"The current coverage in the media of the crisis over Iran's moves to resume research and development of nuclear fuel is in danger of being portrayed in the same light as the build-up to the war with Iraq. While Iran's move to resume nuclear fuel research is a worrying development, there is still the opportunity for a diplomatic solution to the current crisis."

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21 October 2005

"Post-secondary education in Africa must be the focus for EU" – former Schools Minister

STEPHEN TWIGG, Director of the Foreign Policy Centre, and a former Minister for School Standards today said:

"Thanks to G8 leaders, over the next 5 years the EU has $100 billion to spend on African Development. On Monday and Tuesday, Hilary Benn will meet with his EU counterparts to discuss how that money is spent. I urge those Ministers to read the Foreign Policy Centre's action plan, "Leeds Manifesto; How to Spend $100 billion for Africa" and give a new focus to investing in post-secondary education in Africa.

"We must see education in the round – it is not just about books for school-children, but it is a means for people of all ages to escape poverty. Post-secondary education in Africa must be the focus for the EU.

Download the press release (10 kilobyte PDF; need help viewing PDFs?)

By Thiago de Aragao.

Nobody should be surprised at the result of the referendum on autonomy held on Sunday, May 04, in the province of Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia. The highly anticipated "Yes" victory, to be confirmed by the end of the week when the vote's official results are due to be released, has led to reactions by Bolivia's central government and by the Santa Cruz government too, which did not expect a different result.

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By Alex Bigham. Source: The Guardian's Comment is Free

After meeting on the rugby pitch for their annual match, Fiji's police and army found themselves on opposite sides of a coup d'etat.

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By Richard Gowan. Source: The Globalist

As the United Nations prepares to replace its leader of the past ten years, Ghana's Kofi Annan, with Ban Ki Moon of South Korea, the organisation may be experiencing an eastward shift in more than just the Secretary General's office. As Richard Gowan notes, the UN's peacekeeping focus is already shifting from Africa to the Middle East.

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Feng Zhang, FPC China Programme Manager

In association with Coca-Cola Great Britain

Download the background paper (140 kilobyte PDF; need help viewing PDFs?)

This is an initial background paper to accompany the FPC project on Corporate Social Responsibility in Emerging Markets in association with Coca-Cola Great Britain.

Greg Austin and Claude Misson

October 2005

Download Leeds Manifesto (200 kilobyte PDF; need help viewing PDFs?)

The EU has promised to double aid to Africa in the next five years to complement a new effort by the eight richest countries to promote the welfare, prosperity and security of ordinary Africans. In the last year, EU aid ministers have been offered thousands of pages of advice on how to spend this money. There is a fear that they may double the size of existing aid bureaucracies in Brussels and at home to deliver the increases. African countries will certainly face problems absorbing a doubling of aid if it is delivered through traditional aid mechanisms. This short manifesto is a plea to EU Aid Ministers to take a strategic approach to spending the new money in ways that actually enable more individual Africans to take the lead in transforming their own economic and social systems.

Malcolm Cook

November 2004

Download the report (100 kilobyte PDF; need help viewing PDFs?)

South-East Asian expert Dr Malcolm Cook argues that Indonesia is at a turning point of democratisation. In this policy brief he makes the case that new president Susilo Yudhoyono must receive the full backing of the international community, including the UK and EU, to implement vital reforms and secure Indonesia's status as a model for Islamic democracy.

Date: Wednesday 7th May 2008, 3-5pm

Speakers:

•Salvatore Gabola, Director of Global Stakeholder Relations, The Coca-Cola Company

•Liza Lort-Phillips, Associate Director, Corporate Citizenship

•Graham Baxter, Director,Responsible Business Solutions International Business Leaders Forum(IBLF)

•Sumi Dhanarajan, Co-head,Private Sector Team, Policy Department Oxfam

The Foreign Policy Centre, in association with Coca-Cola Great Britain, presented the third seminar in the 'CSR in Emerging Markets' series on Wed 7 May at Portcullis House. The seminar examined CSR in emerging markets with a focus on marketplace practices, including issues such as consumer relations, ethical trade and responsible investment, and wealth creation. The speakers explored these themes from both business and civil society perspectives.

This event was held in association with Coca-Cola Great Britain

Download Invitation (90 kilobyte PDF; need help viewing PDFs?)

Date: Thursday 8 May, 4.00-6.00pm

Keynote Speaker: Hon Dimeji Bankole, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Federal Republic of Nigeria

Discussant: Femi Longe, Co-founder, Africa++ (a network that helps people in the diaspora connect with Africa's development)

Chair: Hugh Bayley MP, Member of the International Development Select Committee and Chair, All Party Parliamentary Group on Africa

In a public lecture hosted by the Foreign Policy Centre in partnership with the African Foundation for Development (AFFORD), the Hon Dimeji Bankole, Speaker of the House of Representatives, explored the future of governance and democracy promotion in Nigeria.

While Nigeria is Africa's most populous country, it is by far the continent's largest fledgling democracy. The 2007 presidential and legislative elections were widely perceived to be the most flawed in the country's history. Initially, when President Umaru Yar'Adua was nominated by his predecessor, former President Olusegun Obasanjo, there was much speculation that Obasanjo intended to retain the reins of power using the somewhat anonymous governor of Katsina State as an instrument to advance his own political agenda. Today however, Yar'Adua is increasingly regarded as an enthusiastic supporter of 'better government' as a vehicle for tackling the structural constraints that are impeding Nigeria's development, such as the chronic power crisis.

Questions that were explored during this event included: Is President Yar'Adua simply seeking to build his own legitimacy? Can the Nigerian National Assembly effectively shape legislation and adequately monitor and challenge the executive on behalf of the Nigerian people? Is the Nigerian government being distracted from the business of pursuing an ambitious reform agenda? Does democracy have a future in the Nigerian political power struggle?

Download Invitation (50 kilobyte PDF; need help viewing PDFs?)

Date: Monday 10th March 2008, 3pm to 5pm

Venue: Grimond Room, Portcullis House, Bridge Street, London, SW1A 2LW

Speakers:

• Salvatore Gabola, Director of Worldwide Stakeholder Relations, The Coca-Cola Company
• Daniel Graymore, Team Leader, Business Alliance Team, Department for International Development
• Daniel Litvin, Director, Critical Resource Strategy & Analysis
• Stephen Twigg (Chair), Director, The Foreign Policy Centre

About this event:

At this event, the Foreign Policy Centre launched a major project on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in emerging markets in association with Coca-Cola Great Britain. The project will explore the role of multinational corporations' CSR practices in emerging markets in the areas of labour standards, marketplace practices, and the environment. With an initial background paper, this launch seminar reviewed recent trends in multinationals' CSR practices, defined the latest debate on CSR, and established the context for the following three seminars which will form part of this project.

This event was held in association with Coca-Cola Great Britain.

Download the initial background paper (140 kilobyte PDF; need help viewing PDFs?)

FPC & Clifford Chance

The FPC and Clifford Chance recently hosted the following guest speakers:

HE Dr AGUINALDO JAIME, Deputy Prime Minister of Angola & HE Rt Hon DONALD MCKINNON, Secretary General of the Commonwealth Secretariat

The rule of law and access to justice are vital to Africa's economic and social development. However, the challenge of reform is enormous due to the complex reality of each sovereign state. This seminar explored important thematic developments in rule of law reform across the continent, taking a local, national and regional focus.

The FPC research project, Courting Justice: Rule of Law Reform in Africa, was launched at a high level roundtable to be hosted by Clifford Chance. The programme will culminate in an autumn lecture by the Secretary of State for International Development, Rt Hon Hilary Benn MP as well as the publication of a pamphlet which will include a collection of short essays by distinguished writers.

Other speakers included:

Dr Kofi Oteng Kufuor, University of East London

Dr Fareda Banda, School of Oriental and African Studies

Dr Chaloka Beyani, London School of Economics and Political Science

Laure-Hélène Piron, Department for International Development (DFID)

16th March 2006

FPC launches Latin America work with seminar on sustainable development

Stephen Twigg, Director of the Foreign Policy Centre, chaired 'Enterprise in Emerging Economies - Who Can Deliver Sustainable Development?', a round-table discussion launching what the FPC hopes to be the first in a series of events and publications on Latin America.

The seminar was attended by a number of figures from the private, public and NGO sectors. Among the speakers were HE Mr Luis Solari Tudela, Peruvian Ambassador to the UK; Paul Bulcke, Nestlé's Executive Vice President for the Americas; and Thiago de Aragão, a Brazilian political analyst and the FPC's new Latin America Research Associate.

31 October 2005

The FPC hosted a seminar on Democracy and Human Rights in Nigeria at the House of Commons, on Monday 31 October 2005. The main speakers at the event were Olisa Agbakoba, a senior Human Rights lawyer, Boma Ozobia a senior maritime lawyer specialising in the oil and gas sector, Rotimi Sankore, a distinguished journalist and Human Rights Campaigner and Sir Stephen Wall, former adviser to the Prime Minister on foreign affairs. The meeting was chaired by Malcolm Bruce MP, Chair of the International Development Select Committee.

"Nigeria is like a limited liability company owned by 120 million shareholders. The company's shareholders elect the company's employees at the Annual General Meeting (AGM). Tasks are shared among the elected employees and tenure of office is established with a provision for re-election, based on performance, at the next AGM. The dilemma in Nigeria is that the elected employees have stolen the electoral process. They do not want to go. How will the shareholders reclaim their company?"

Olisa Agbakoba

In collaboration with the Migration Policy Group

Diasporas are an important agent in the pursuit of foreign policy objectives. However, most of the research carried out at present focuses on the economic impacts of transnationalism, from the so-called 'brain drain' to the impact on development of remittances sent back by migrants to poorer countries.

Further information