The Business Confederation of the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CE-CPLP) hopes that during the Cape Verdean presidency of the organization the issue of mobility will be overcome, said Jorge Spencer Lima, the outgoing vice president.
“We have always said that without mobility there is no community, without mobility there is no business and without business the CPLP is an empty bag, a hollow bag, to the extent that no part of the world has built a community of politicians. Politics is a fundamental element of this process, but it does not exist alone,” said Spencer Lima, who was appointed as the new honorary president of the EC-CPLP.
“Without mobility, if entrepreneurs cannot move from one place to another, if they cannot meet to discuss, to do business, we will continue to talk about something that in practice has no substance,” added the president of the Sotavento Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Services, quoted by Cape Verdean news agency Inforpress.
The outgoing president, Mozambique’s Salimo Adbdula, was of the same opinion and he added that there is a great expectation from CPLP entrepreneurs on the issue of mobility.
Both took advantage of the presence of the Minister of State and the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, Fernando Elísio Freire, who led the opening of the General Meeting, to ask for support in this struggle, in order to take an important step in the issue of the mobility of goods and people and even of capital.
Freire recalled that Cabo Verde already has visa-free agreements with some CPLP countries, namely Angola, São Tomé and Príncipe and Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau through ECOWAS, reiterating that the “great objective” of the presidency of the CPLP is to ensure that there is free movement of citizens in the common area.
The EC-CPLP met in Praia on Tuesday at a general meeting, during which Cabo Verde took on the organisation’s presidency from 2018 to 2022.
