Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla congratulated Pacheco for his election as President of IPU. In a message to Pacheco, Birla said “Your success in the election is a success of your vision of strengthening parliamentary diplomacy.” Speaker Om Birla hoped that Pacheco’s belief in ideals of democracy, rule of law, consensus building and multilateralism would help in building a stronger and more focused Inter Parliamentary Union in sync with the changing times.
Earlier, the Governing Council of Inter Parliamentary Union (IPU), Geneva resumed its business during the 206th Session in virtual format. The election process to elect the new IPU President through remote electronic secret ballot, with a 24 hour window for casting votes came to a close at 1930 hrs.
The Indian Parliamentary Delegation led by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla and consisting of Poonamben Hematbhai Maadam, MP and Swapan Dasgupta, MP attended the meeting of the IPU Governing Council. The Secretary General Lok Sabha, Snehlata Srivastava also attended the virtual meeting.
During the day, the election for filing up the vacancies in the IPU Executive Committee was also held. During the election, Laurence Fehlmann Rielle from Switzerland and Beatriz Argimon from Uruguay were unanimously elected to the IPU Executive Committee.
Further, the IPU Secretary General presented the summary of the financial results of IPU for the period 2019-2020. In this context, the Financial Report of the internal auditor was made available to the participants. Also the Budget for the year 2021-22 was presented by the Chairman of the IPU Sub Committee on Finance which was duly approved by the Members of the Council.
The Secretary General of IPU presented the Report on the Fifth World Conference of Speakers of Parliament (5WCSP) organised by IPU and Parliament of Austria in virtual format from 19 to 20 August 2020.
– Shailendra Mishra