Attendance
Christine Clough, Saad Filali, Gillian Dell, Shaazka Beyerle, Maureen Karikuki, Kol Preap, Vincent Lazatin
Agenda
- Update on advocacy planning and activities: from Kristi, Maud and Gillian
- Updates from other members of the CCC and regional coordinators
- Next steps with UNCAC Coalition statement: Gillian
- COSP funding, logistical arrangements and plans to share COSP workload: Gillian
- Planning ahead of the COSP
- De-centralisation of CCC work
- Communication of CCC work to Coalition
- AOB
1. Update on advocacy planning and activities: from Kristi, Maud and Gillian
Gillian gave a quick update about the work that has been ongoing since the meetings in Vienna. CCC members and RCs have been busy working together in three sub-working groups focusing on access to information, beneficial ownership and asset recovery lead by Lydia, Kristi and Maud respectively. The highest priority is to maximize impact at the COSP.
In addition, TI-S sent emails to NGOs in countries where Executive Summaries have been published to support a campaign for the publication of full reports and some positive feedback was received already.
Kristi then gave an update on the work of the sub-working group on the prevention covering access to information and beneficial ownership. Kristi has been working together with Lydia together ahead of prevention WG meeting in Vienna at the end of August. In terms of strategy, she reported that a briefing note is finished, and the group is currently working on a letter (3 pages) to go out to embassies in Vienna so they have it before the WG meeting.
There will also be targeted follow-up with key countries to get a dialogue going and get the issues on the agenda of the meeting. If anyone has questions about countries targeted please approach Lydia or Kristi; Kristi also offered to circulate this information to the CCC and RCs.
Gillian invited the members of the group who so far not have not actively engaged with the preparatory work but are interested in the topics and would like to join the group to please express that interest. The letter mentioned by Kristi will be finalized by Tuesday, 13 August 2013.
In the absence of Maud (who could not attend the conference call) Gillian gave an update of the work on asset recovery. The strategic approach taken on asset recovery is a bit different than with the other two topics. There is no specific message/ask submitted to the WG but the plan is to write to specific government representatives. A targeted group of 8 countries considered to be influential actors and interested in the area was selected (it includes for example Nigeria, France, UK, US, etc.) and the idea is to send them the final Coalition Statement with the Asks on Asset Recovery and to request a phone call or a meeting and thus move to a more personal discussion and invite them to a meeting in Vienna. Gillian will be going to the 2 WG meetings at the end of August and Maud will go to the WG meeting on asset recovery. They will try to use the time outside of the meetings to engage government representatives.
As a general point, Gillian emphasized that we are not too late to act but we need to be moving quickly next week to have impact at the WGs and make use of phone calls and personal emails to engage people’s interest and get a commitment from them for the issues we are advocating for. She raised the need for more work in Asia and asked Vincent and Kol if they could engage and where they could give support.
Questions
Saad asked Gillian to elaborate on the role of attending the WG meetings in Vienna and highlighted an opportunity to engage with STAR and the Arab Forum ahead of the COSP.
Gillian explained that the main aim of being in Vienna during the WG meetings is to meet government representatives beforehand either in groups (regional, like-minded, etc) or individually to advocate for our positions. Another important opportunity will be the possibility to hold discussions about funding for the COSP and further ahead.
With regard to the Asset Recovery initiative she added that Babatunde is also involved as Nigeria is open to some of our views which is a good door opening. She also pointed out that we have been in touch with STAR about our asset recovery proposals but warned that STAR has to appear neutral in these discussions and thus cannot be an official ally. Another piece of information is that STAR will hold a 1 day asset recovery meeting during the COSP and a Coalition representative may be able to be on their panel.
In response to Gillian, question about work in Asia
Vincent reported that he had a meeting with the focal point in the Philippines and has been pushing the government to assume a leadership role in this area. While the focal point is a relatively low level official it may be possible to side-step him and go higher up but there are some risks involved with such a move.
Vincent agreed with Gillian that contacting other groups in the region could be a good approach to identify allies. He also offered to ask the focal person of the government to see what contacts he has in the region. As for the Coalition Statement, he shared the pre-IRG version with the government. The wording is similar to the Statement the government used at the IRG so they are very supportive.
Shaazka asked if TI National Chapters (NCs) are individually doing work on this in some countries and if so whether there is a possibility for a coordinated effort – reflecting unified stance.
Gillian explained that a lot of TI NCs have some experience with this type of advocacy and reasonable interest in UNCAC and for the selected topics we will try to bring them in. Initially we will be focusing in a few governments to try to get them to have a strong voice in the meetings in Vienna. But the way we do advocacy may change after the WGs especially is some language starts emerging ahead of the COSP.
Kol agreed that reaching out to government requires a two way dialogue which can be quite a challenge and a time consuming task. He proposed to approach TI chapters in the countries identified and ask them to identify the right person to reach out to in the government. He also raised the question whether we could align ourselves with key institutions such as the World Bank that might also have an interest in our advocacy objectives.
2. Updates from other members of the CCC and regional coordinators
This item was skipped due to time restraint.
3. Next steps with UNCAC Coalition statement: Gillian
Gillian reported that the Statement is basically is finished after a wide consultation process. The next step is to circulate the document to the Coalition and give members about a week to provide comments and then after the WG distribute the final Statement and ask Coalition members to circulate it further and discuss it with their governments.
There were no objections to this proposal.
4. Other
In the interest of time the remaining agenda items were skipped. Instead the group briefly brainstormed about activities we could organize at the COSP (if we come up with an ambitious idea that might need to be prepared ahead of time).
Gillian reminded the group that there are various things going on already – GOPAC and GIZ will have a meeting each and we are planning to ask for a slot to discuss the findings of the UNCAC Progress Report under preparation at TI-S. Any panel on which this is presented could include a wide range of other issues as well.
Vincent expressed the view that the whistleblower panel at the IRG was well received and perhaps the reason is because we have been able to show expertise on the issue which the delegates appreciated. Thus, if we have an opportunity to continue with that and bring in expertise on different issues and get country delegates to appreciate our contribution to the discussions that would be very good. What that topic should be is yet to be decided.
Activities previously done at the COSPs included a flashmob and other creative initiative to grab people’s attention. Vincent suggested creating some sort of asset recovery display that would show data on how much money was stolen. It could show money piling up during the week. He also suggested having an event with build up to the last day, for example a mystery game that would get delegates engaged and talking.
Vincent proposed to form a subgroup and work with Lydia and Maureen on developing some further ideas on activities and they will circulate their proposals to the wider group next week.
Next Steps
- Vincent, Lydia and Maureen to form a sub-working group on COSP activities and circulate suggestions to the CCC and RC by 16 August.
- Next CCC conference call: please fill out the Doodle poll with your preferred day and time.
Key Dates
- 26–28 August: Working Group on Prevention
- 29–30 August: Working Group on Asset Recovery
- 25–29 November: COSP