Your Excellency, President Pohamba;

Honourable Ministers and Deputy Ministers;

Ladies and gentlemen;

I would like to express our sincere gratitude and appreciation for the warm welcome and hospitality extended to us since our arrival in this beautiful country.

 

Excellency and Dear Brother,

 

Your warm and kind words of welcome have made us to feel at home.

And indeed, when we are in Namibia, we are not only at home but we are also among our long-time friends and comrades.

South Africa and Namibia share historical, geographical, cultural and fraternal bonds. Our relations were cemented during difficult times of our respective struggles for liberation against colonialism and apartheid.

Ours are therefore relations of a special kind which make it only natural and logical for our two countries enjoy strong bilateral cooperation.

 

Your Excellency

 

Today is a special occasion as we are formally inaugurating the South Africa/Namibia Bi-National Commission (BNC).

We signed the Agreement establishing the BNC last year during your historic State Visit to South Africa, my dear Brother.

The BNC replaces the Heads of State Economic Bilateral Forum and broadens our cooperation beyond economic areas to include political, social and security areas.

This was a natural progression as our two countries cooperate in a wide range of areas such as trade and investment, energy, agriculture, health, mining, transport, environment, tourism, science and technology, education, security, water, to mention but a few.

 

We look forward to further boosting economic cooperation.

 

Trade levels remain high, but we can and must push trade volumes even higher.

Our deliberations should also help us to put a firm foundation in our collective fight against poverty, underdevelopment and unemployment.

The deliberations in this BNC should also contribute to taking forward regional integration and the promotion of intra-African trade, and in particular infrastructure development to ease movement of people and goods.

 

Your Excellency,

 

Regarding peace and stability in our region, we wish to take this opportunity to commend you and your country for the sterling work you are performing in your capacity as the Chair of the SADC Organ on Politics, Defence and Security.

Your country has ably led the SADC Election Observation Missions to both Swaziland and Madagascar. In this regard, we wish to assure you of our continued support. 

 

Your Excellency,

 

We successfully hosted over the past three days in South Africa the joint SADC-International Conference on the Great Lakes Region and also the African Capacity for Immediate Response to Crises Summit.

 

We are pleased with the progress made in both meetings.

In the SADC-ICGLR summit we agreed as the regions to work together more closely to promote peace and stability in the Great Lakes region.

We strongly believe that the African Standby Force, which is a key instrument of the African Peace and Security Architecture, should remain on track. We look forward to its full operationalization in the not too distant future.

 

But before that happens, it is important to have a temporary response mechanism.

We will be working together on these key initiatives Your Excellency, in both regional multilateral forums and in our bilateral engagements.

We will shortly be receiving reports from Ministers and Senior Officials who have been meeting for the past two days and I look forward to successful deliberations.

 

Thank you once again for hosting us for this important visit.

I thank you.