Proposed amendment to IAP Constitution

Proposal to amend IAP Constitution Article 6.3 and 6.4 to be approved by the General Meeting

During the development of a new digital membership administration system the IAP Secretariat became aware of some inconsistencies in the separation of powers related to the processing of deactivation and suspensions of membership due to lack of payment of membership subscriptions. This motivated the Secretariat to submit a draft amendment of Article 6.3 and 6.4 for discussion by the Executive Committee during its 49th meeting, which due to the Corona virus COVID-19 Outbreak was convened through a digital consultation in the first week of April.

The current Article 6.3 reads:

“The Executive Committee may suspend the membership of or expel an organisational member who or which is two years in arrears in payment of annual dues and may reinstate the member to full membership on payment of the arrears.”

The current Article 6.4 reads:

“The Secretary-General may suspend the membership of or expel an individual member who is two years in arrears in payment of annual dues and may reinstate the member to full membership on payment of the arrears.”

The IAP Secretariat is of the opinion that an “expulsion” as referred to in both articles is a permanent and too severe a punishment for simply not paying an annual subscription and does not fit subsequent dispensation rules mentioned in both articles; to reinstate a member to full membership after the payment of arrears.

During the digital consultation, the Executive Committee agreed to recommend to the membership to delete the wording “or expel” from the existing provision in Article 6.3 and Article 6.4. The Executive Committee further agreed to recommend to the membership to replace a “may” with “shall” in Article 6.4.

Proposal: to replace existing Article 6.4 with the following.

“The Secretary-General may suspend the membership of or expel an individual member who is two years in arrears in payment of annual dues and shall reinstate the member to full membership on payment of the arrears.”