JURISAI’s inaugural General Meeting held in Paris
A decisive step has been taken to affirm, promote and strengthen the Jurisdictional SAI model.
On October 8, 2024, the Cour des Comptes de France had the honor of hosting the first Constitutive General Assembly of JURISAI, the international organization that succeeded the Forum of Jurisdictional SAIs, created in 2015, also in Paris, to promote the jurisdictional model and strengthen related professional standards and practices.
In his opening speech, the First President of the French SAI, Pierre Moscovici, expressed his pride at the progress made since the Paris Declaration, the founding act of the Forum of Jurisdictional SAIs in 2015. The creation of JURISAI, whose structure was formalized last June in Casablanca with the signing of its articles of association, is a direct extension of the Forum’s work. JURISAI’s mission is to promote and strengthen the jurisdictional model of SAIs within INTOSAI.
First row, from left to right: Zineb El Adaoui, First president of the Moroccan SAI, Pierre Moscovici, First president of the French Cour des comptes, Margit Kraker, General Secretary of INTOSAI and president of the Austrian SAI, and António Francisco Martins, Vice-president of the Portuguese SAI.
Pierre Moscovici also recalled that at the 2019 INCOSAI, the first Intosai standard entirely dedicated to jurisdictional activity, INTOSAI P-50, was adopted. It is now, he added, the reference standard that sets out the twelve principles that must guide the actions of SAIs with jurisdictional powers in the exercise of their functions.
Bruno Dantas, President of the TCU and current President of INTOSAI, thanked the French Cour des Comptes and the Ecuadorian SAI for their decisive role in the Forum of Jurisdictional SAIs, whose achievements have laid a solid foundation for the future. Bruno Dantas then declared that the heads of SAIs with jurisdictional competencies gathered today for this General Assembly were united by the same desire to innovate, cooperate and offer the greatest possible added value for the benefit of their organizations. He then emphasized that JURISAI, open to all SAIs with jurisdictional competencies, was now ready to become an associate member of INTOSAI at the next INCOSAI congress.
Finally, Bruno Dantas acknowledged the presence of Margit Kraker, General Secretary of INTOSAI, and thanked her for the attentive listening, benevolence and support she has always shown towards jurisdictional SAIs and throughout the process leading to the creation of JURISAI.
Margit Kraker then spoke as guest of honor at the General Assembly, to underline the importance of JURISAI as an initiative to facilitate and develop the exchange of experience, knowledge and good practice. She praised the decisive role played by Bruno Dantas in the creation of JURISAI, and underlined the particular characteristics of jurisdictional SAIs, both in terms of their relations with their parliaments and the specific powers they exercise. Finally, she stressed the crucial role of jurisdictional SAIs in the system of accountability of public managers, and looked forward to working closely with JURISAI.
This first General Assembly then proceeded to elect the members of the Governing Board, with the following appointments:
Chairman: Cour des Comptes of France
First Vice-President: Tribunal de contas of Portugal
Second Vice-President: Tribunal de Contas da União of Brazil
Secretary General: Cour des Comptes of the Kingdom of Morocco.
The SAIs of Angola, Djibouti, Mauritania and Spain were also elected to the Board.
With regard to the standing committees, Brazil will chair the Finance, Administration and Communication Committee, Italy will be in charge of the Public Prosecution Committee, and Senegal of the Capacity Building Committee.
The meeting concluded with Bruno Dantas presenting JURISAI’s strategic plan. Adopted by a show of hands by the members present, the plan aims to consolidate JURISAI’s role and is based on three objectives:
- to facilitate knowledge sharing and cooperation between SAIs to enhance the effectiveness of their jurisdictional functions;
- to strengthen the capacities of member SAIs, particularly in terms of training and institutional development;
- promote the benefits of the jurisdictional model within the international INTOSAI community.
Discussions also focused on JURISAI’s full integration into Intosai as an associate member, which would be a further step towards international recognition of the SAI jurisdictional model. The aim is to achieve this at the next INCOSAI Congress in 2025.
In the afternoon of October 8, four workshops were held on the themes of public prosecution; administration, finance and communication; capacity building; and a thematic commission to identify topics of interest not covered by the standing commissions. All these exchanges helped to define the orientations and strategies of the various commissions, and to discuss JURISAI’s next steps, particularly with a view to the next meeting of the JURISAI Steering Committee in 2025.
JURISAI symposium: “Auditor and judge: supreme audit institutions that make decisions”.
As a prelude to the JURISAI General Assembly, the Cour des Comptes, with the support of FONDAFIP, organized the JURISAI International Colloquium, held on Monday October 7, 2024.
The colloquium, opened by First President of the French Cour des comptes, Pierre Moscovici, Bruno Dantas, current President of INTOSAI and President of Brazil’s Tribunal de Contas da União, and Michel Bouvier, President of FONDAFIP, the public finance think tank, focused on the following theme: “Auditor and judge: supreme audit institutions that make decisions”.
It brought together almost 300 participants from 34 SAIs and numerous experts around two round tables to discuss the conditions for harmonious complementarity between the functions of auditor and judge, as well as the stakes and challenges of jurisdictional decisions.
Élisabeth Guigou, former Minister and member of the Conseil Supérieur de la Magistrature, was the keynote speaker at the symposium, which was concluded by the First President of the Cour des comptes of the Kingdom of Morocco, Zineb El Adaoui.
Find out more about the jurisdictional SAI model:
- Read the special issue of the INTOSAI Journal on jurisdictional SAIs.
- Discover the 7 key advantages of SAI jurisdictional functions.
