…as he highlights successes of the SACU
BY KWANELE TSABEDZE
LOZITHA – His Majesty King Mswati III today took time to highlight some of Eswatini’s positive achievements, such as economic growth.
His Majesty was speaking at the 8th Summit of the Southern African Customs Union (SACU) Heads of State and Governments held today at the Mandvulo Grand Hall at Lozitha.
“We do realise that the vehicles of trade, such as SACU, were not built in one day, but we trust that they will be developed gradually, leading to a day when we can all say Africa is now trading effectively. We also need to bring forth and share other success stories under SACU to motivate best practices that can be adopted by the AfCFTA, to boost intra-Africa trade,” said His Majesty.
“The SACU success story follows on the footsteps of other positive economic developments in Eswatini, which has been recognized by the World Bank as one of the top five growing economies with our GDP growth at 7.43% in 2021,” His Majesty noted.
“We have also been ranked second when it comes to manufacturing value added per Capita in the African Continent, while ranking 6th in the Africa Industrialisation Index of 2022,” further noted His Majesty when detailing some of Eswatini’s success stories.
“The Kingdom is also proud to have become one of two countries that have successfully met the AIDS global targets of 95-95-95, marking our commitment to ending HIV and AIDS,” said His Majesty King Mswati III before concluding his remarks.
His Majesty is the current Chairperson of the SACU following the previous summit. He was speaking to heads of government of the SACU, including President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa, Prime Minister Samuel Ntsokoane of the Kingdom of Lesotho, Prime Minister Dr Saara Kuugongelwa-Amadhila, SACH Secretariat, as well as Ministers and Senior Officials from the different member states.
The themes of the ongoing summit revolve around topics which His Majesty touched on during his speech:
- Industrialisation, export,and investment promotion,
- Trade facilitation and logistics,
- Implementation and leveraging AfCFTA opportunities;
- Trade relations/unified engagement with third parties,
- Finance and resource mobilisation; and
- Effectiveness of SACU Institutions
