Member's statement: Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference, Cape Town
Member's statement by Dr Steve Aiken OBE on .
- MLA
- Dr Steve Aiken OBE
- Party at the time
- Ulster Unionist Party
- Date
- 21 September 2026
- Type
- Member's statement
- Business
- Members' Statements
- Heading
- Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference, Cape Town
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5741794
Read the official Assembly record
Text
Last week, I attended the annual Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference in Cape Town, South Africa. The themes of the conference were delivering democracy across the Commonwealth nations; the impact of the day-to-day use of AI; the challenges to the international system of trade; and particularly how the rules-based international system is being abused. The conference also concentrated on war in the Horn of Africa; on the horrors of what is happening in Sudan, Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of the Congo; on how the West appears fixated only on Gaza and not on the millions elsewhere facing starvation, actual genocide and sexual violence; and on the scramble for resources that is turning many parts of Africa into warlord fiefdoms, in which the use of child labour and child soldiers is helped by our obsession with the latest technology.
It was, however, the discussions about gender-based violence that really struck home. The thoughts and prayers of every Member should be with the nine female victims, and their friends and families, at Kempton Park, which is near the international airport in Johannesburg. Over 5,500 people are murdered every quarter in South Africa, over 1,600 of whom are women. Gender-based violence is a disease everywhere, and it must be dealt with. The conference, with over 900 delegates representing 56 nations and one third of the world's population, welcomed representatives from Morocco, Brunei and Ukraine as associate members. Members from across the Commonwealth asked me why Ireland decides to boycott that valued North/South and east-west organisation, which is a developed and developing world body that contains some of the key members of BRICS. One person who put that point to me was a senior member of the African National Congress. It is well beyond time that Ireland parked its anti-Britishness and looked to join the Commonwealth as at least an associate member. We should all be asking why it does not do so.
318 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
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