Declaration by the President of the Congress Gudrun Mosler-Törnström

Strasbourg, 01.02.2017 - The Kingdom of Morocco has recently embarked on the ambitious work of regionalisation, decentralisation and the strengthening of local and regional democratic governance, to which the Congress has made its contribution.

In this context, I welcome the reintegration of Morocco into the African Union after 33 years of absence, which was announced at the 28th African Union Summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on 30 January 2017.

I am confident that the return of Morocco to the African Union will allow it to further pursue its decentralisation process in cooperation with the other countries of the continent, all the more so since the African Union adopted on 27 June 2014 the African Charter of Values and Principles of Decentralisation, Local Governance and Local Development.

The Congress stands ready to accompany Morocco and the other countries of the African Union with its expertise and its own tools, such as the European Charter of Local Self-Government, and hopes that Morocco will very soon become a Partner for Local Democracy, a status established by the Congress in October 2014.