Sadc, EAC Chairpersons meet to appoint DRC peace facilitators

Source: Sadc, EAC Chairpersons meet to appoint DRC peace facilitators | The Herald (Top Stories)

Africa Moyo in NAIROBI, Kenya

SADC Chairperson President Mnangagwa is expected to arrive here today where he will, together with his counterpart President William Ruto of Kenya, who is also the East African Community (EAC) Chairperson, finalise the formal appointment of five facilitators to tackle the conflict in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

The meeting, which is expected to take place at State House tomorrow, will also formally adopt the documents relating to the facilitators’ terms of reference and discuss the funding modalities for the team.

Apart from President Mnangagwa and Dr Ruto, the meeting will involve the facilitators, namely former Nigeria president Olusegun Obasanjo, former Kenyan leader Uhuru Kenyatta, former Central African Republic president Catherine Samba-Panza, former Ethiopian president Sahle-Work Zewde and former Botswana president Dr Mokgweetsi Masisi.

Other senior officials expected to attend include African Union Commission Chair Mr Mahamoud Ali Youssouf, SADC Executive Secretary Mr Elias Magosi and EAC Secretary General Ms Veronica Nduva. In an interview yesterday, Permanent Secretary for Foreign Affairs and International Trade Ambassador Albert Chimbindi confirmed President Mnangagwa’s participation.

“As you would appreciate, His Excellency President Mnangagwa is the current Chairperson of SADC and he, together with his colleague, His Excellency President Dr William Ruto, who is also the current Chair of the EAC, have been tasked by the first joint summit between the two regional communities (SADC and the EAC) that they should appoint a facilitation team (and) they should also brief the facilitation team after it has been appointed. They were also tasked to work towards the merger of the Luanda and the Nairobi processes towards achieving peace in the DRC,” he said.

“So, this meeting is being convened for their Excellencies to come and do three main issues; the first one is to actually formalise the appointment of the panel of facilitators.

After these facilitators have been appointed, they need to be given their marching orders for them to start the work of bringing peace to the DRC.”

As part of their work, the facilitators are expected to meet the DRC political leadership and all non-State actors to attain comprehensive peace in the Eastern DRC, which has been devastated by war, leading to thousands of deaths and millions of displacements.

The SADC and EAC leadership resolved to combine forces to find lasting peace, especially considering that the DRC is a member of both SADC and the EAC.

In that regard, the first-ever joint summit of SADC and the EAC was convened in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania on February 8 this year.

That summit resolved to change the approach to finding peace in the DRC, by not only engaging the government, but also non-State actors.

It also realised the need for a team of experienced former Heads of State and Government, who could navigate the complexities of the DRC conflict.

Said Ambassador Chimbindi: “It’s a conflict that has been going on for a very long time and a lot of effort has been deployed, but peace has remained elusive.

“So, the approach taken this time is to say, while we are engaging the (DRC) government, we also realised that you needed to have dialogue between the DRC people themselves, and this is what the EAC has been handling under the Nairobi process, which was being spearheaded by former president Uhuru Kenyatta, who is also one of the facilitators.

“Now we had to draw up the terms of reference of these facilitators, just to say what exactly they are going to do and how they are going to do it.

“So, this is what the two Presidents are going to do; they are going to formally appoint them (facilitators) and then they will formally inform them of their terms of reference. The other issue is that we will also talk about the process of merging the two processes, the Luanda process and the Nairobi process, to see how best we can have this as a smooth process.”

Pursuant to this, meetings have been taking place between the SADC and EAC secretariats and the African Union Commission.

Once the facilitators have been commissioned by President Mnangagwa and Dr Ruto, funding modalities would be discussed since they will be travelling around to engage the necessary people.

Ambassador Chimbindi said once everything has been said and done, President Mnangagwa, as SADC Chairperson, “would have accomplished the tasks that have been assigned to him” with regards to DRC peace, before handing over the Chairmanship to Madagascar next month.

The appointment of the facilitators comes amid reports of continued fighting in eastern DRC despite a peace deal signed between the government and M23 rebels barely two weeks ago in Doha, Qatar.

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