By After his successful visits to the first two regional States, Zimbabwe’s President, Emmerson Mnangagwa has taken off to his third destination, Namibia.
Mnangagwa first visited Pretoria, South Africa where he met with the country’s President, Jacob Zuma. On Friday, Mr. Mnangagwa took off to his second visit to Luanda, Angola, meeting up with his counterpart, Joao Lorenco, the President.
On his tours, the President of Zimbabwe briefs his counterparts on the political situation in Zimbabwe and the forth coming general elections – reports show.
In Namibia, Mnangagwa will meet with Hage Geingob, the country’s President.
In an interview yesterday, George Charamba, the presidential spokesman confirmed the president’s visit to Namibia and also added that the President would also use the visit to explain the opportunities presented by the new dispensation that took over power in November 2017, following the resignation of the former President, Robert Gabriel Mugabe.
‘Firstly, this is a courtesy call and the second objective is to appraise leaders in the region on the very stable situation that is reigning in Zimbabwe and together with that the preparations that are underway towards the 2018 harmonized elections which must be free, fair and credible,’ Mr. Charamba explained.
‘The third objective is to explain the policies of the new era and what opportunities are there for joint venture projects, cross boarder investment and skills sharing that can take place between our countries to promote value addition in SADC as well as skill sharing. This is consistent with the resolution made by SADC during the Extraordinary Summit held in Harare during the chairmanship of the former President Mugabe.’
‘Specifically with reference to Namibia, we have a contingent of Zimbabwean engineering and veterinary experts who were seconded on request by the Namibian Government. Already the relationship has been developed and what we need to do now is to consolidate it,’ he added, ‘but all of it is predicted on an extraordinary gesture by the Namibians when we saw Hage Geingob, the sitting President coming in the company of his predecessors (Sam Nujoma and Hifikepunye Pohamba) to witness the inauguration of President Mnangagwa in November. It is a turn which deserves more than reciprocation because essentially what Namibia did through that gesture, was to demonstrate the deep relationship between our people and our leaderships.’
After visiting Namibia, President Emmerson Mnangagwa is also expected to visit other SADC countries soon – Charamba stated.
Correspondent: Shamilah Namuddu