Overview of implemented projects

Not all projects included in the Annex to the Joint Declarations with Cape Verde and Morocco were subsequently found in the scoreboards. For Cape Verde, this is the case of three projects. The first project relates to a proposal by Portugal to develop a bilateral cooperation instrument between the Portuguese Institute for Employment and Vocational Training (IEFP) and its Cape Verdean counterpart, with the aim of simplifying and boosting the efficiency of worker migration procedures. This project was implemented bilaterally and struck out of the scoreboard. Simultaneously, while implementing the Mobility Partnership, a bilateral cooperation instrument was signed between the Portuguese IEFP and its counterpart in Cape Verde, with a view to simplifying and reinforcing the efficacy of the procedures for labour migration.

¹

Ibid.

Second, Luxembourg proposed to offer a twinning project between partner universities. In February 2009, the Universities of Luxembourg and Cape Verde signed a Framework Agreement setting the basis for cooperation between both universities.^[1] The agreement was valid for a period of five years but has not been renewed. Third, Spain proposed to reinforce the capacity of the Ministry' of Defence in respect to new information and communication technologies. It was not possible to ascertain further details concerning this project. In 2008, Spain and Cape Verde concluded an agreement for joint Maritime surveillance. However, limited information is available to conclude that these two initiatives are linked.

In the case of Morocco, 12 projects proposed in the Annex were no longer in the scoreboard. Several reasons have been put forth by' the different partners. One project aimed at supporting the Joint Master in International Migration and Social Cohesion, but in January 2014 its Erasmus+ Rinding was not renewed, which marked the end of the project. This project was not included in the scoreboard. One project proposed by France, relating to police capacity' building on issues such as human trafficking and false identification documents, is still ongoing but was no longer included in the scoreboard. When enquiring about it, a French official answered that it might just have been forgotten. This illustrates the problem linked to the updating of the scoreboard. Generally, partners are required to update all information on short notice, before a meeting through emails exchanges as there is no real organ in charge of monitoring Mobility' Partnership projects. The level of details and precision varies with the amount of time available to complete this task. A project proposed by' the Netherlands is still ongoing but not included as such in the scoreboard, as it is now linked to the voluntary' return and reintegration project implemented by IOM. Finally, a Spanish official indicated that the projects proposed in the Annex by' Spain were not being implemented if they were not included in the joint Sharaka project. Some projects have been included in the joint initiative and others have been mostly excluded from the scoreboard. This does however not mean that the projects have not been implemented. One project on irregular migrant children was implemented as a bilateral activity'. This illustrates the fact that Spain prefers not to include all their bilateral activity' with Morocco in the scoreboard in order to have some visibility' on key initiatives.

Out of these 12 projects, 5 have been cancelled. An EU official declared that the fact that these cancelled projects are no longer mentioned anymore in the

EU Mobility Partnerships - Cape Verde and Morocco 101 scoreboard is a problem, as it results in a loss of memory on the evolution of the Mobility Partnership.¹'"’³ For now, no tool exists which keeps all the information centralised, thus making it difficult to conduct an evaluation of the implementation. A project proposed by the ETF has also been cancelled. This project was not aimed directly at Morocco and had already been implemented in Moldova and Georgia however it did not seem sufficiently relevant for Morocco. Portugal also cancelled a project that they proposed. According to a Portuguese official interviewed in Rabat, no projects proposed by Portugal have been implemented so far.^[2] He added that the cooperation between Portugal and Morocco is good but not of prime importance, which can explain the lack of action. The lack of available funding on the Portuguese side is another explanation. The latter official made a further remark that Portugal concluded the Mobility Partnership with Morocco for political reasons, rather than, for the concrete implementation of projects. This is in line with the argument in which Portugal’s migration policy goes hand in hand with the Spanish migration policy. As the Mobility Partnership with Morocco is of high importance for Spain, Portugal supported its conclusion. Moreover, he suggested that the project proposals were not received with enthusiasm by Morocco. The Portuguese representative argued that if Morocco decided to take the initiative, the projects could be implemented at a bilateral level. The Netherlands also cancelled two projects. According to a Dutch official, the activities that were proposed by the Immigration and Naturalisation Service (INS) in the framework of the Mobility Partnership have not yet started. As of the time of writing, it is not clear when exactly the implementation will take place, due to matters of finance. The INS is in regular contact with the Ministry’ of Security and Justice of the Netherlands and with the EU, regarding funding possibilities and the timing of the activities mentioned. Most of the cancelled and not implemented projects are the result of a lack of funding from the Member States. Nonetheless, when looking at the content of the mentioned projects, there is some evidence that the projects may have affected the content of the two main joint projects included in the Mobility Partnership at a later stage. Namely, the Sharaka project and the project ‘promouvoir l’intégration des Migrants au Maroc’ (Promoting the integration of migrants in Morocco).

A surprising finding is the transformation of four general initiatives proposed by’ the EU in major joint Mobility Partnership projects. The initiatives are aimed at supporting the implementation of the Mobility Partnership itself, as well as developments in Moroccan policy. The first project aims at fighting human trafficking and included activities relating to the elaboration of the legal framework, the training of Moroccan officials and information campaigns for the sensitisation of public opinion and the protection of victims. The second project supports theimplementation in Morocco of a national asylum system and its related legal framework. The third project comprises a set of possible axes of intervention to be discussed with Moroccan authorities, such as the support to the implementation of the Mobility Partnership and support to the implementation of a migration policy. Finally, the objective of the fourth project is to reinforce the capacities of the National Agency for the Promotion of Employment and Skills (Apence Nationale pour la Promotion de PEmploi et des Competences (ANAPEC)), the Moroccan employment agency, to enhance employment possibility in Morocco. The first three propositions by the EU have been translated into a key project, introduced into the Mobility Partnership in 2015 and benefiting from EUR 10 million^[3] in EU funding: ‘Promoting integration of migrants in Morocco’. It aims to support the implementation of the National Strategy for Immigration and Asylum (NSIA) adopted in 2014. The strategy' covers several aspects such as access to health care, the right to legal housing and the fight against human trafficking. Another initiative financed by the project ‘Promoting integration of migrants in Morocco’, is included as a new initiative in the scoreboard and was started in 2014. It aims at drafting a strategy' for the reception and integration of refugees, asylum seekers and their families, directly' relating to the NSIA.

Finally, in the Annex to the Joint Declaration with Morocco, the EU suggested several ‘possible axes of intervention to be identified in collaboration with the Moroccan government’, which became three out of the four pillars of the Sharaka project: ⁸ capacity building of the ANAPEC in the field of labour migration, the creation of a migratory' profile of Moroccans living abroad and the mobilisation of their competences and migration and development. In the framework of this third pillar, the EU offers a new project on financial education and money' transfers. Concerning the last pillar, return and reintegration, the EU previously proposed two projects aiming at social and educative reintegration of Moroccans that have returned to Morocco and promoting the mobility of people and competencies. This shows the will for better and clearer communication between partners. It also illustrates the evolution of the working cooperation between all partners. It is an interesting case study for cooperation between different partners in the framework of the Moroccan Mobility Partnership. When proposing activities during the drafting of the Annexes to the Joint Declarations, Member States tend to propose bilateral initiatives that they' either had already developed or were planning to develop. Through the Sharaka project, seven Member States decided to collaborate on joint initiatives. The Sharaka project is one of the two projects that aims

EU Mobility Partnerships - Cape Verde and Morocco 103 at supporting the Mobility Partnership.^[4] According to an EU official, it also aims at showing Morocco that the Member States are working to avoid overlapping projects. This project is a way to reward the conclusion of the Mobility Partnership as it foresees ways for Moroccans to access the EU labour market. In practice and as of the time of writing this aspect of the project has still not been launched. This initiative had a considerable effect on the reshaping of proposed projects. For instance, the Italian Ministry of Labour and social policies decided to delete the projects that they proposed at the time of the conclusion of the Mobility Partnership. This was due to the fact that they were not considered by Morocco as responding sufficiently to their needs and therefore were not included in the Sharaka project. Out of three projects, two appear as deleted in the scoreboard and one as concluded because Italy realised previous activities in 2013, 2014 and in January 2015. Moreover, the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy proposed a new bilateral project which was implemented from February' to August 2015, relating to circular migration for young workers in fields such as tourism and agriculture. Spain is also an important partner in the Sharaka project; the Ministry' of Employment and Social Security decided not to implement their proposed initiatives as bilateral projects but to propose them all through Sharaka. Out of six projects, four have been included in Sharaka. In the scoreboard, the other two initiatives are still defined as being in preparation, showing that Spain has not abandoned the idea of implementing these projects bilaterally. The only project proposed by Sweden has been included in Sharaka. France is an interesting case as it proposed to delete four projects in order for the scoreboard to reflect as satisfactorily' as possible the initiatives that are effectively implemented through the Mobility Partnership. This includes two initiatives that have not been accepted as being part of Sharaka concerning students’ residency permits and an information programme on the French labour market.

Moreover, when analysing the scoreboard, we can see that several key projects have been implemented satisfactorily. In Cape Verde, a Common Visa Application Centre has been running since 2010, processing approximately 9,000^І6я visa applications a year. In addition, different bilateral initiatives related to labour migration are ongoing. Two of the main initiatives were the CAMPO project and the project Diaspora for Development of Cape Verde (DIAS de Cabo Verde), which have already been concluded. These two projects aimed atpromoting legal mobility between Cape Verde and Europe, circular labour migration and return and reintegration of migrant workers. Once the initial CAMPO project ended it was incorporated into the Cape Verdean administration (in the Ministry of Communities) but it was discontinued in 2016. Finally, a visa facilitation agreement for short-term visas and a readmission agreement were concluded in October 2012 and April 2013, respectively, and both are currently in force. The negotiations of a readmission agreement have been taking place even though Cape Verde neither signed the Geneva Convention of 1951 on the status of refugees nor has the capacity to receive returned migrants. A proposed project related to the ratification by Cape Verde of the Geneva Convention has never been implemented and Cape Verde is still only part of the 1967 Protocol. They do not have the practical facilities, nor do they even have any clear idea of how to create such facilities.^[5] The fact that Cape Verde is divided into different islands, with different airports, creates complex circumstances and would also require high financial means to replicate the same facilities on several islands.

Projects that have been proposed after the conclusion of the Mobility Partnership with Cape Verde were directly answering the needs and interests of all parties. As mentioned during several interviews with EU and Cape Verdean officials, projects implemented in the framework of the Mobility Partnerships were used to identify specific needs for Cape Verde and to develop new projects aiming at addressing the recognised shortcomings. As was in the case of the project ‘Strengthening of Cabo Verde’s Capacities in Migration Management’, which supported the development of a policy to address irregular migration. This project is coordinated by Portugal but includes France, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. It was also the case of a project implemented under the MIEUX Programme aiming at developing the National Migration Strategy and Action Plan in order to reduce irregular migration and improve legal mobility. These projects have a high polity relevance for Cape Verde as they support the drafting and implementation of Cape Verde’s new migration strategy’. We will come across the same circumstances in the case of Morocco as follows. One initiative included in the scoreboard following the adoption of a Directive in 2014 on seasonal workers, aimed at using the flexibilities offered by this Directive, in order to favour seasonal work and circular migration. Additionally, a short project on the theme of circular migration was proposed by Italy for implementation in 2015. However, this

EU Mobility Partnerships - Cape Verde and Morocco 105 was a bilateral initiative that was not solely directed towards Morocco. Another new initiative called '‘Droit des migrants en action'?⁷⁴ aims at enhancing migrants’ rights, however, it is not only directed towards Morocco. Finally, three new initiatives aim at directly supporting one or several pillars of the Sharaka project.

In each Mobility' Partnership, projects are divided into topics. These topics are not always the same from one Mobility' Partnership to the other and the categorisation can evolve between the Annex and the scoreboard. The policy' context and priorities have an impact on the projects proposed and implemented. Table 2.2 shows the evolution of the distribution of projects by topics in the Annex to the Joint Declaration with Cape Verde and in the scoreboard.

We can see that even though the share of projects related to border management and irregular migration were plentiful in the Annex, it nonetheless increased over the years. On the other hand, the number of projects related to legal migration became less numerous and no direct reference to labour migration are further made. This could be seen as an argument supporting the existing assertion¹⁷⁵ that the Mobility' Partnership is used by' the EU as a migration management tool aiming at increasing the difficulty for third country' nationals to accede to Europe.

In Cape Verde, the new projects that have already been implemented have been proposed in the areas of legal migration, migration and development and horizontal issues. Two of the horizontal projects consist in the development of the

Table 2.2 Evolution of the distribution of projects by topics for Cape Verde*

• 174 For more information: http://www.ifrc.org/fr/introduction/migration/les-droits-des-migrants-en-action/about-the-project/ (accessed 29 November 2017).
• 175 Meng-Hsuan Chou, European Union migration strategy towards West Africa: the origin and outlook of “Mobility' Partnerships” with Cape Verde and Senegal (2009) EUSA Working Paper 1, 20-22.

National Immigration Strategy and Action Plan and the drafting of the new Migration Framework Legislation. These projects illustrate the policy and legal relevance Mobility' Partnerships can have. The increase in the number of projects under the topic Migration and Development can be linked to the adoption of the National Emigration Strategy' for Development^[6] in 2014, as it includes a significant migration and development component. The National Emigration Strategy' for Development includes projects that were previously falling under employment, such as the conclusion of bilateral working agreements, or a new project implemented by LuxDev aimed at the development of the labour market in Cape Verde.

Regarding Morocco, border management, irregular migration and human traffick-ing/smuggling are also a primary' source for projects but unlike Cape Verde, mobility' and legal migration is given more weight than migration and development. It is also interesting to note that the highest number of pre-existing projects for a category’ (20), was concentrated on mobility' and legal migration. However, the highest number of concomitant projects (27) was centred on combatting irregular migration and border management. This illustrates the initiative of Member States to include in the Annex all positive initiatives that have already been implemented in Morocco to give more weight to their negotiations. As such, Member States benefit from a better negotiating position to impose more constraining projects, for instance, the conclusion of a much-criticised readmission agreement. The topic that has the best ratio of implementation is Migration and Development and particularly' projects on the mobilisation of Moroccans’ competencies. While the topic widt the lowest implementation ratio pertains to Mobility, legal immigration and integration. The focus of dtese topics indicates policy' orientations which are substantiated by the EU funding priorities for migration related issues.

Table 2.3 Evolution of the distribution of projects by topics for Morocco*

* Based on the scoreboard for Morocco of 2017.

Note: This table shows the evolution of the distribution of projects by topics in the Annex to the Joint Declaration with Morocco and in the scoreboard. For example, projects related to legal migration and mobility went from 35 in the Annex to 43 in the scoreboard indicating an increase in this ty pe of projects.

Unlike the case of Cape Verde, the scoreboard for Morocco is very detailed and classifies projects under several objectives rather than general topics. The objective that includes the biggest number of new projects is integration, which belongs under the topic mobility, legal immigration and integration. This objective is not homogeneous and includes diverse types of projects related to migrants’ rights, to asylum or also to business-related migration. The number of projects in the scoreboard does not exactly coincide with the actual number of projects as some projects are separated under different topics. Therefore, they seem to be slightly more numerous.

• [1] European Migration Network, National Contact Point Luxembourg, Circular and Temporary Migration, September 2011, 1, 94. 2 For more information, see: http://www.misoco.org/about-misoco/about-misoco. hunt (accessed 28 November 2017). 3 Interview 8 (nl31). 4 Interview 7 (n89). 5 For more information, see: https://www.iom.int/assisted-voluntary-return-and-rein tegration (accessed 29 November 2017). 6 For more information, see: http://www.sharaka.ma (accessed 29 November 2017). 7 Interview 17 (n89).
• [2] Interview 3 (n!32). 2 Interview 11, Portuguese Embassy, Rabats, 18 January’2016. 3 For more information, see: http://www.migration4development.org/fr/content/lancem ent-projet-%C2%AB-promouvoir-l%E2%80%99int%C3%A9gration-migrants-maroc-%C2% BB-cadre-partenariat-mobilit%C3%A9-ue-m (accessed 29 November 2017).
• [3] Interview 28 (n68). 2 No official legal document isopen to the public for now. For more information, see: http:// www.marocainsdumonde.gov.ma/fr/le-minist%C3%A8re/affaires-de-la-migration/strat% C3%A9gie-nationaIe-dimmigration-et-dasile (accessed 29 November 2017). 3 For more information, see: http://www.expertisefrance.fr/fre/Domaines-d-activite/ Gouvernance-et-Droits-humains/Migrations-projet-SHARAKA-au-Maroc (accessed 29 November 2017). 4 Germany, Belgium, Spain, France, Italy, the Netherlands and Sweden.
• [4] Interview 3 (n!32). 2 Ibid. 3 Ibid. 4 Informal email exchanges with the Italian Ministry' of Labour, May' 2015. 5 Informal email exchanges with the Spanish Ministry' of Employ'ment and Social Security, May' 2015. 6 Information available in the Scoreboard. 7 For more information about this project, see: http://www.campo.com.cv (accessed on 12 December 2017). 8 For more information, see: https://gfmd.Org/pfp/ppd/3 (accessed on 12 December 2017).
• [5] Interview 38, IOM, Praia, 24 February 2016. 2 Ibid. 3 Interviews 33 (n42), 39 (n30) and 45 (n42). 4 The project is called ‘Strengthening of Cabo Verde’s Capacities in Migration Management’. For more information, see: https://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/case-studies/ strengthening-cape-verdes-capacities-migration-management_en ( accessed on 12 December 2(517). 5 For more information about MIEUX, see: https://www.mieux-initiative.eu/en (accessed 12 December 2017). 6 Directive 2014/36/EU on the conditions of entry’ and stay of third-country nationals for the purpose of employment as seasonal workers, 26 February' 2014, L 94/375.
• [6] Resoluto do Conselho de Ministros n°33/2014 de 9 Janeiro (Estrategia Nacional de Emigrado para o Desenvolvimento). 2 ICMPD and IOM, A Survey on Migration Policies in West Africa (2015) 1, 124.