SADC cancels Maputo face-to-face summit

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SADC cancels Maputo face-to-face summit

4:39 CAT | 09 Feb 2021

File photo: Noticias

The Southern African Development Community (SADC) has proposed to the organisation’s Executive Committee the cancellation of the Heads of State and Government Summit originally scheduled for March 20 and 21, on the grounds of the new wave of Covid-19 infections in the region.

The proposal is still awaiting consideration by Mozambican head of state Filipe Nyusi in his capacity as SADC chairperson. President Nyusi is expected to take into account the recommendation of the recent meeting of regional ministers of health to cancel the organisation’s face-to-face meetings until the pandemic subsides.

The information was made public in Maputo yesterday by the director for Regional and Continental Integration at the Mozambican Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, Alfredo Nuvunga, after a virtual meeting of the SADC Executive Committee, chaired by Minister Verónica Macamo as president of the Council of Ministers of the regional community.

“The summit was scheduled for March this year. We are now in the second week of February, and everything indicates that conditions for holding face-to-face meetings do not obtain. A discussion took place, and the recommendation is for the summit to be postponed to a date to be decided,” Nuvunga said.

At the virtual meeting yesterday, the Executive Committee assessed the work done by the Mozambican presidency so far, and the alignment of its priorities in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The body praised regional efforts in the face of the pandemic, at a time when the SADC report, based on figures from the Africa Disease Control Centre (CDC-Africa), classifies the regional epidemiological situation as “worrying”, with new infections rising.

For the Mozambican presidency, in addition to the issue of security, the holding of the business forum and the establishment of a regional Humanitarian and Emergency Operations Centre in Nacala, Nampula province, continue to be priorities.

The last face-to-face meeting between SADC heads of state and government took place in Maputo last December, and was attended by presidents Cyril Ramaphosa, from South Africa; Mokgweetsi Masisi (Botswana); Emmerson Mnangagwa (Zimbabwe); and the Vice President of Tanzania, Samia Suluhu, representing President John Magufuli.

Source: Noticias