ACTIVITIES OF SECRETARY-GENERAL IN SOUTH AFRICA, 7 – 10 JULY 2002
The Secretary-General arrived very early on Sunday, 7 July, in the South African port city of Durban from Vienna, Austria, after having made two refuelling stops in Tunis, Tunisia, and Libreville, Gabon.
He began his official visit in South Africa on Sunday morning with a one-on-one meeting with President Thabo Mbeki, host of a two-day summit that transformed the Organization of African Unity (OAU) into the African Union.
On Sunday afternoon, he held talks with Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi on the Horn of Africa, before meeting with the heads of United Nations agencies, programmes and specialized agencies attending the summit.
He addressed the thirty-eighth summit of the Organization of African Unity on Monday, telling the delegates that Tuesday’s proclamation of the birth of the African Union was a tribute to the OAU’s success.
“It is an occasion to celebrate and, more important, an occasion for hope”, he said. But he cautioned, “Let us not imagine that, once proclaimed, our Union will become reality without further effort.”
Noting the difficulties that faced the European Union, he told those gathered that a successful African Union would require “great stamina and iron political will, combined with the readiness to accept a seemingly endless series of negotiations and compromises”.
He said that Africa is gaining a new sense of respect, and the leaders “will respect us even more when they see us actually resolve conflicts that disfigure our continent. And I do mean, resolve them. Managing them is not enough and will not be enough”.
The Secretary-General touched on the importance of the New Partnership for Africa's Development, or NEPAD, which he described as an African model for development, based on an investment-friendly climate.
"Yes, Africans need help from the outside -- from those who of late have been more successful or more fortunate than us", he said.
Finally, he looked ahead to the World Summit on Sustainable Development, to take place in Johannesburg, South Africa, in August.
“This time, the stakes will be higher”, he said. “We have to trace a path for development that will not only be shared by all nations, but can be sustained and enjoyed by future generations. In this part of Africa, already stricken by drought and menaced by famine, you need no reminder of the urgency of that task.”
He urged the delegates, “Let us apply ourselves, as Africans, to persuading the rest of the world to join us next month and start implementing the measures we all know are needed, if development is to be truly sustainable.” (See Press Release SG/SM/8298.)
Before addressing the OAU summit, the Secretary-General had two meetings on the Middle East: one with Amre Moussa, Secretary-General of the League of Arab States; and another with Farouk Kaddoumi, Representative of Palestinian National Authority President Yasser Arafat.
On the sidelines of the summit, he held a series of bilateral meetings with African leaders on Monday afternoon. He met with President Paul Kagame of Rwanda and then with President Pierre Buyoya of Burundi, President Jose Eduardo dos Santos of Angola, President Joseph Kabila of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and President Sam Nujoma of Namibia.
He also had a joint meeting with President Al Hadji Yahya Jammeh of the Gambia and President Kumba Yala of Guinea-Bissau.
His last bilateral discussion was with Tunisian Foreign Minister Habib Ben Yahia and another with former South African President Nelson Mandela, before watching a fireworks display on the eve of the birth of the African Union.
The Secretary-General then attended a late night banquet hosted by President and Mrs. Thabo Mbeki for the heads of State and government and spouses and invited guests.
On Tuesday morning, the Secretary-General attended the inaugural session of the Assembly of heads of State and government of the new African Union.
The birth of the African Union was celebrated in a three-hour extravaganza at a stadium for 2,000 people, complete with a flyover, parachute landings, performances by Zulu dancers in traditional dress carrying spears and shields, and the launch of the Union's theme song -– called "Unity Afrika".
The Secretary-General watched as the Presidents of the African Union States walked into the stadium behind their national flags and heard the crowd give a huge welcome to former South African President Nelson Mandela. The crowd, which waved miniature flags of the member States, also roared when the Senegalese and South African soccer teams were brought in.
On Tuesday afternoon, he continued his busy schedule of bilateral meetings with leaders gathered for the summit. He met first with President Benjamin Mkapa of the United Republic of Tanzania. Later, he met with Presidents Ismail Omar Guellah of Djibouti, Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria, Abdikassim Salad Hassan of Somalia, Gnassingbé Eyadéma of Togo, as well as with Prime Minister Lamine Sidimé of Guinea, and the Rt. Hon. Don McKinnon, Secretary-General of the Commonwealth.
Also that afternoon, he witnessed the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the World Food Programme (WFP) and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The heads of those two agencies –- respectively, James Morris and Ruud Lubbers –- signed an MOU strengthening their cooperation in providing food aid to refugees and returnees, which could help benefit some 20 million refugees around the world, more than a third of them in Africa.
The Secretary-General and the two agency chiefs then answered several questions from reporters. In response to a question on Angola, the Secretary-General said the initial focus is the humanitarian situation, which is one of the most serious on the continent, in order to save lives and then move on to recovery and reconstruction programmes. “We do intend to have a donor conference to try and raise money once we come up with the programmes”, he said. “I also have advised the Government of Angola, which is seen by many donors as relatively
rich, that they are expected to make a gesture themselves and the people should begin to see some peace dividends, and that if they can also switch some of their resources from the war effort to the peace effort, it will encourage other donors to come in ...”
On Tuesday evening, South African President Mbeki hosted a meeting with the Secretary-General, Rwandan President Paul Kagame and Congolese President Joseph Kabila to discuss the situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The Secretary-General departed South Africa for the Sudan on Wednesday morning, 10 July.