President João Lourenço addresses SADC Troika meeting

Windhoek, ANGOLA, August 17 - The Angolan Head of State, João Lourenço, chaired the Troika meeting of the Southern African Development Community's (SADC) defense and security cooperation body Thursday in Windhoek, Namibia.,

The meeting was attended by Presidents Edgar Lungo from  Zambia and Jhon Magufuli from Tanzania, countries which are part of the troika.

 

João Lourenço currently chairs the SADC defense and security cooperation body and is in the Namibian capital, from Thursday to participate in the 38th Ordinary Summit of Heads of State and Government of the regional organization, to be held as from 17 to 18  August.

 

The Troika meeting was also  attended  by the President of South Africa, Ciril Ramaphosa, under the chairmanship of SADC.

 

The meeting reviewed the political situation in the Kingdom of Lesotho and the Democratic Republic of Congo, (DRC).

 

DRC is currently preparing elections to be held  in December 2018.

The meeting will also look at the situation in Madagascar and Zimbabwe, which are SADC's  member countries.

 

Presidents of the DRC, Joseph Kabila of Zimbabwe, Emerson Mnangagwa, and former Mozambican President Joaquim Chissano, as mediator of the situation in Madagascar in a troubled political instability also attended the Troika meeting.

 

The Republic of Angola will cease  the presidency  of  SADC political, defense and security cooperation body, and will hand over to Zambia.

 

Speaking on the eve of the 38th Summit of Heads of State and Government of SADC, Angolan Foreign Minister Manuel Augusto, in Windhoek, said the Summit will  address issues concerning the peace and security of southern Africa.

 

SADC's strategy is for a common future, to ensure economic well-being, improved standards and quality of life, freedom and social justice, as well as peace and security for the peoples of Southern Africa.

 

"We have electoral processes under analysis," said the minister, referring to what will be done this year in DRC and Madagascar, as well as what happened recently in the Republic of Zimbabwe.

 

At the meeting, according to Manuel Augusto, will be endorsed to the Heads of State the decision to make March 23 as the Day of Liberation of Southern Africa, obeying a national holiday for the countries that make up that region.

 

At the moment, the 23 of March is the day consecrated the battle of Cuito Cuanavale  in Angola.

 

South Africa, which hosted the last summit in August 2017, is currently the chair of SADC.

 

 At this summit in Windhoek, South Africa will handover the presidency to Namibia.

 

The Southern African Development Community (SADC) emerged from the transformation of the then SADCC in 1992, comprising 15  countries totaling a GDP of about 226 billion dollars and a population of approximately 210 million people.

 

SADC groups Angola, South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mauritius, Seychelles, Malawi, Kingdom of Eswatini , Lesotho, Zimbabwe, Madagascar, Mozambique and Zambia.

 

Another issue that will top the leaders' agenda is related to the transformation of the SADC Parliamentary Forum into the Regional Parliament.

 

It will be up to the Angolan parliament speaker, Fernando da Piedade Dias dos Santos, to present the arguments for the transformation at the summit.

 

The SADC Parliamentary Forum was established in 1997 as an autonomous institution of SADC and consists of 14 parliaments from the region.

 

 It was created on the occasion of the 17th Summit of Heads of State and Government of the Community held in Blantyre, Malawi.

 

This Parliamentary body has been creating solid foundations for the transformation into a regional parliament, a goal that has lasted for more than 21 years.

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