12 Jan 2022

Leaders of the 16-member Southern African regional bloc has resolved to extend the SADC Mission in Mozambique (SAMIM) and institute post-conflict recovery assistance in the country’s Cabo Delgado region.

This was revealed at the end of a SADC extraordinary summit in Malawi yesterday which had brought together the bloc’s leaders, including Botswana represented by Vice President Slumber Tsogwane.

The mission, first deployed in July last year for a period of three months, had been extended by another three months. The extension expires mid-January.

Reading the communique issued at the end of the summit, SADC executive secretary Mr Elias Magosi said the meeting “noted the good progress made by SAMIM and extended its mandate with associated budgetary implications.”

Mr Magosi said the summit also approved a framework for support to Mozambique outlining actions for consolidating peace, security and socio-economic recovery in the Cabo Delgado region.

To that end, some SADC states had already pledged food assistance for internally displaced persons in the region.

SADC also commended the initiative of convening an international conference on the economic and social reconstruction of  Cabo Delgado Province.

According to Mr Magosi, the summit resolutions were guided by a report submitted by SADC Organ on Politics, Defence and Security troika plus countries contributing troops to SAMIM as well as Mozambique endorsed by the SADC Council of Ministers the previous day, Mr Magosi said.

SADC chairman Dr Lazarus Chakwera said the organisation came up with the resolutions having reviewed progress made by SAMIM and guided by a need to ensure the terrorist threat did not resurface.

Dr Chakwera said SAMIM had made remarkable progress in neutralising the terrorist insurgency in Cabo Delgado therefore the post-conflict plan for providing humanitarian assistance was a necessary step.

He noted that many internally displaced people had returned to their homes and needed assistance to return to normal lives.

Dr Chakwera said regional assistance would augment Mozambique government’s Cabo Delgado Reconstruction Plan aimed at rebuilding infrastructure destroyed by conflict and providing a development stimulus to improve the region’s outlook in order to lessen the opportunity for extremists to thrive in future. Ends