Open letter about recent changes in ESA

Dear ESA Members, dear colleagues,

We wish to share with all of you three steps forward for the improvement of ESA that we have taken, abiding by our democratic mandate from the ESA members. To achieve the target of transparency and accountability the following issues were addressed:

• To ensure the recognition of the ESA statutes as the basis for organizing the work of the ESA office
• To prevent the increase in the costs of the ESA office and have a public budget. 
• To protect all ESA office staff members

The President and the majority of the Executive Committee have worked to restore functioning of ESA described in the ESA statute. In Particular Article 6.2: “The term of the President and the Executive committee is two years beginning at the General Assembly held at the ESA Conference every two years (…)” and Article 6.4: “The President appoints a General Secretary and an Executive Secretary. The Executive Committee, with the advice of the President, appoints three Vice-presidents and a Treasurer from within the Committee. The President, the General Secretary, the Treasurer and the Executive Secretary constitute the ESA office. The ESA office reports to the Executive Committee and is responsible for implementing its decisions”.

The aim of increasing transparency and accountability towards all ESA members has been strongly pursued along this term as a service to all members. This will lead to finally having a public budget for the first time by the end of this Exec term.

The President and the Executive Committee have the responsibility, as elected members, to resolve the problems found and protect the ESA, and in the process, this involved changes in the Office. The problems were discussed in detail among the Executive Committee in several meetings, with presentation of undeniable relevant evidence. The Executive Committee asked for legal advice to preserve the reputation of ESA and ensure the attention of democratic rules.

Following a democratic process within the Executive, with the expressed aim to reach a decision on how to resolve the above-mentioned problems, the decision was taken by majority vote (12 in favour, 1 abstention, 4 against). The four members who voted against did not accept the democratic decision and resigned.

In these last days, following the statutes of ESA, and the democratic mandate of its members, the President has invited the next most voted candidates to join the Executive Committee.

At present, and notwithstanding the pandemic that we are living, the Executive Committee and the ESA office are working in very good collaboration, preserving transparency in all processes, while the Conference and all ESA activities are successfully moving forward.