Speaking to Lusa, the executive secretary, Zacarias da Costa, said that the increase that should be proposed in the Council of Ministers (bringing together the heads of diplomacy of the Member States), prior to the organization's summit, which takes place on the 27th in Sao Tome and Principe, is expected to enter into force in 2025.
According to the Timorese diplomat, this increase in quotas allows the CPLP to have an annual budget of around "3.2 million euros" and a structure that allows the Portuguese-speaking bloc to "face new challenges".
The proposal was analyzed at a meeting of the Permanent Consultation Committee (CCP, which brings together the ambassadors of the nine Member States), last Friday, diplomatic sources told Lusa.
According to Zacarias da Costa, in the last CCP other documents were approved, namely for the creation of two positions for the new directorate of Economic and Business Affairs, personalities to be indicated by Angola, which holds the rotating presidency of the organization until the summit in São Tomé e Príncipe, which will then assume leadership for the next two years.
This department was created to respond to the challenges of the fourth objective of the CPLP, Economic Cooperation, proposed by the Angolan presidency, and already included in the organization's statutes, since it was approved at the last extraordinary meeting of the Council of Ministers in Luanda.
The official added that Angola allocated "a sum of more than 400,000 euros to cover the payment of remuneration and the rest [of the cost] that is associated, through the transfer of the Special Fund to the financing budget, to cover these costs of the two personalities who will integrate the executive secretariat".
This meant, according to the executive secretary, the green light for the "operationalization" of the new direction.
Thus, the memorandum of understanding and the contracts will be signed in São Tomé and Príncipe, on the 24th, even before the summit, and the new board will be able to come into operation in September in Lisbon.
The budget for the operation of the new department is allocated by Angola "for three years", that is, the funding of the new department is assured until 2025.
Asked how funding for this new direction would be ensured after 2025, the executive secretary replied: "I believe that the Member States, by agreeing to the creation of the new direction, are also thinking about the sustainability of the organisation".
The proposals that are being prepared to go to the Council of Ministers, which precedes the XIV Conference of Heads of State and Government of the CPLP, "also contemplate a career adjustment, an adjustment in salaries, an increase in personnel, not only for the new direction, but also for other areas that are being undervalued", he stressed.
And, therefore, "an increase in mandatory contributions" from Member States will also be proposed, he concluded, implying that the proposal has positive opinions from the countries that make up that organization.
