According to the Cape Verde ambassador in Lisbon, the text of the mobility proposal "is precisely what came out of the VI Joint Technical Meeting" on the matter, held in February, and which also had a positive appreciation from the Permanent Concertation Committee (CCP) CPLP (meeting of the ambassadors in Lisbon of the nine member states of the organization).
The mobility proposal is the main highlight on the agenda of the 15th extraordinary meeting of the CPLP Council of Ministers, which takes place by video conference.
"What we are presenting in terms of the mobility project is a model that offers a framework, which we call variable geometry, that is, it is absolutely flexible and it supports various levels of mobility and also different speeds in the implementation", he explained to Lusa the ambassador Eurico Monteiro.
In addition, "it allows partnerships between Member States according to their interests and their internal constraints".
"What unites us is the fact that we have the minimum mobility of the citizens of the Member States", stressed the Cape Verdean diplomat, so the "commitment between the different Member States is to progressively seek more advanced levels of mobility ".
The initiative foresees that some mobility titles in the Portuguese-speaking space will be exempt from fees, while others will have costs to be defined bilaterally, but subject to a "maximum ceiling", a "precautionary measure, to avoid that the fixing of fees may constitute an obstacle to the mobility "at CPLP, underlined Eurico Monteiro.
On the other hand, the certification of academic and professional orders and the contributions of citizens to Social Security will be determined by the internal regulations of the States.
After approval by the ministers, the proposal will proceed to final approval at the conference of heads of state and government of the organization, scheduled for this year in Luanda, and which will mark the transition of the presidency of the CPLP to Angola.
The meeting's agenda also included the sharing of information on the situation of covid-19 in the Member States.
In addition, said Eurico Monteiro, ministers should appreciate the new Equatorial Guinea integration program - which joined the CPLP in 2014 - and which also had a favorable opinion from the CCP, after the ministers decided, in 2019, in the Cape Verdean city Mindelo, move forward with this plan.
The opening session, scheduled for 10 am in Cape Verde, includes interventions by the Cape Verdean Minister of Foreign Affairs and Communities, Rui Figueiredo Soares, and the organization's executive secretary, the Portuguese ambassador, Francisco Ribeiro Telles.
