A delegation of the City of
Matola, led by its mayor Calisto Cossa, president of the IOPD, visited the city
of Barcelona to close the preparations of the 16th IOPD Conference
to be held in the Mozambican city from 4 to 6 May. During this visit they have
held several meetings to define the programmatic and organizational details of
the international event that is expected to draw some 1,500 participants.
On March 7th, they met with Gala
Pin, Councillor for Citizen Participation of Barcelona City Council and
Secretary General of the IOPD, and the coordinator of the Technical Secretariat
Adrià Duarte. As part of this gathered were completed to outline the themes of
the various panel discussions and activities held in the Conference. The event
aims to be a meeting point for politicians, technicians and experts in models
of participatory public policies in different regions of the world.
Then the organizing committee of
the Conference met with UCLG staff (United Cities and Local Governments) to
exchange views and focus the theme of the Conference in the framework of
Habitat III. UCLG will help spread the IOPD Conference and serve as a bridge
with local governments and other international actors. Assistant Secretary
General of UCLG Emilia Saiz, who participated in the meetings with the
president of the IOPD and his team, emphasized the need for the IOPD Conference
serves previous thematic work facing the UCLG Congress of Bogota to be held in
October 2016 just before the Habitat III summit of Quito.
Finally, the organizing committee
also met with the 3rd Deputy Mayor of Barcelona Jaume Asens to exchange views
on the Conference and open a dialogue for cooperation between the two cities.
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