07 Oct 2018

Speaker of the National Assembly, Ms Gladys Kokorwe has urged African Parliaments to be visionary and constantly communicate the vision of their institution with those they lead.

Ms Kokorwe, who was addressing the 19^th ZimZam senior parliamentary staff seminar in Kasane over the weekend, further observed that collective efforts and bigger picture approach to issues could contribute to developing countries and the region as well as ensuring regional integration.

 The seminar, which was attended by Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mauritius, and Namibian parliamentary clerks and secretaries, was held under the theme; Transformation; Key to Responsive Parliaments.

However, Ms Kokorwe said the seminar came at the right time with regional and global community grappling with a myriad of developmental challenges, saying the forum gave her the opportunity to address the very people who were at the core of driving and overseeing the implementation of strategies.

“For a successful transformation in Parliament, we need to interrogate the mandate of parliament, identify performance gaps then develop strategies towards transformation,” Ms Kokorwe said.

She further observed that such  seminars and other capacity building programmes should be regular to facilitate exchange of knowledge and information while encouraging clerks and secretaries to think of ways to capacitate MPs effectively to execute their mandate.

She further acknowledged the seminar, saying it came at the right time as most countries were preparing for general elections.

Meanwhile, Botswana was re-welcomed this year after being absent from the forum for years, hence the name ZimZam was changed to ZimZamBots to incorporate her. ENDs