Summary of the 8th General Assembly (Santiago de Compostela)
Centre Maurits Coppieters’ 8th General Assembly was held last month (15 February 2014) in Santiago de Compostela, Galiza under the name of “Generation Self-Determination”. It has been held together with the European Free Alliance (EFA) and European Free Alliance Youth (EFAy), confirming the good sensations we had last year jointly celebrating our most important event of the year. It was a fruitful event in which the work of the foundation was made available once again to actors and stakeholders other than Centre Maurits Coppieters members. The event was hosted by our founding member Fundación Galiza Sempre.
This annual event brings together Centre Maurits Coppieters members and friends from all across Europe to review the activity of the foundation, discuss its road map and take the most important statutory decisions for the future of the organisation. This year’s General Assembly confirmed the sustained growth of the Centre Maurits Coppieters family with solid links among its members. We are now an extended net of nine members and five associated members. If you want to comment on the pictures we’ll be happy to discuss them below or in our facebook album.
The General Assembly confirmed the appointment of a new Bureau. Xabier Macias repeated as president, so did the rest of his team, who will work together for the upcoming three years. Another important issue is the change of name of our Scientific Board, which won’t be called this way any longer. The body will be known as Advisory Scientific Council from now onwards.
Nova direcció de @IdeasForEurope @MartinezTomey Günther Dauwen Antonia Luciani @xabiermacias Alan Sandry i Josep Vall pic.twitter.com/4ere4Fz0q3
— Fundació Irla (@FundacioIrla) February 15, 2014
EFA and EFAy’s General Assemblies were held in parallel with Centre Maurits Coppieters events. Our president Xabier Macias, delivered a speech and presented the Activity Report within the EFA General Assembly, which counted with the presence of Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) Ian Hudghton, Mark Demesmaeker, François Alfonsi, Iñaki Irazabalbeitia, Tatjana Zdanoka and Ana Miranda, among dozens of other participants from political parties all across Europe and with a wide representation of Bloque Nacionalista Galego members, including party leader Xavier Vence.
We also repeated one of our most successful events of last year; the dinner-debate. This year’s keynote speaker was the German professor Klaus-Jürgen Nagel, and the event was organised under the title “Roadmaps towards self-determination in Europe”. You can read his full intervention here. Nagel and the audience engaged in a rich and highly interactive conversation especially regarding a number of commonalities that most of the roadmaps towards self-determination have, and the differences among relevant cases in Europe.
This year’s General Assembly presented a brand new format of conference; a round-table debate. Each of the three organizations appointed one speaker to join a debate around the topic of self-determination. Daniel Turp took the floor on behalf of Centre Maurits Coppieters and carried out some important statements highlighting the importance of the current situation, with two referenda planned within EU Member States knocking the door. You can read a full report of the event here.
Preparation of tomorrows #time4sd debate. Don't miss out the interventions by @danielturp @rgaroby @lorenalacalleA pic.twitter.com/Fr6APxyAmY
— Coppieters Foundation (@IdeasForEurope) February 14, 2014
Other highlights of the event where the presentation of our two most recent publications: Law and Legitimacy: the denial of the Catalan voice and Internationalism versus Globalism as well as the coverage online via the twitter hashtags #CMC14GA and #Time4SD.