Member States of the Southern African Development Community cannot continue to rely on international cooperating partners for financing, Foreign Affairs and International Trade Minister Ambassador Frederick Shava has said.
Speaking at the closing ceremony of the SADC Council of Ministers meeting, which he now chairs, at the New Parliament Building in Mount Hampden, Ambassador Shava said the regional bloc needed to meet its financial and statutory commitments.
"We need to timeously meet our financial and other statutory obligations if we are to succeed in the implementation of the transformative strategies that we have in place.
"We cannot rely on international cooperating partners, who have their priorities, important as their contribution and generosity has been and can be. Our implementation scorecard especially in the most critical areas of infrastructural development, on industrialisation and regional integration, is not good, as revealed by the report of the Executive Secretary," he said.
Amb Shava said the 16-member bloc should rationalise its decision-making processes and take fewer decisions, concentrating on those that have the best chance of being implemented.
"Our organisation, SADC, cannot do everything. The principles of subsidiarity and complementarity should guide us," he said. This would mean member states doing what they do best without everything coming to the regional level.
Peace and security, said Amb Shava, remained a top priority for the region as it was the bedrock for the region's sustained development.
"We still have to do more, collectively, to ensure that we have peace and security, the prerequisites for development, in the entire region. We have to invest heavily in peace and security to deal with old, new and emerging challenges and threats," he said.
The leveraging of the region's ample resources was critical and had to be harnessed to accelerate the region's development.
Amb Shava expressed Zimbabwe's commitment to putting shoulder to the wheel in its new role, as chair of the regional bloc's offices.
"We have to leverage the bountiful natural resources and human capital through harnessing innovative information communication technologies to improve the lives and livelihoods of our people. We have all recognised the imperative for beneficiation and value-addition of our primary commodities to create more jobs and optimise our export earnings.
"I assure you of my unwavering commitment to fulfill my mandate in the best interests of SADC. I will certainly rely on the guidance of our principals, as well as on your vast experience and collective wisdom to contribute to the region's transformation," he said.
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In an interview on the sidelines of the Council of Ministers meeting, SADC Executive Secretary Mr Elias Magosi said progress had been noted in the region's peace and security, although the regional body needed to ramp up infrastructural development efforts.
"Overall, in terms of peace and security, there is good progress, they recognised that. We heard the Minister in his closing statements that we still have a lot to do under infrastructure because infrastructure is the bedrock of all other pillars that we have in our regional strategy," he said.
President Mnangagwa will on Saturday assume the Chairmanship of the bloc at the 44th SADC Summit of Heads of State, taking over from Angolan President João Manuel Gonçalves Lourenço.
