BY DELISA THWALA
EZULWINI – President Cyril Ramaphosa who will be participating at the 8th Southern Africa Customs Union Summit in Eswatini will arrive tomorrow morning.
The SACU summit is going to be held tomorrow at Mandvulo Hall in Lozitha.
A senior delegate from South Africa revealed that the President will land tomorrow morning.
“Our president will land as early as Thursday morning and we will be there to welcome him,” said the delegate chair.
The President‘s working visit at the SACU Heads of State and Government Summit is at the invitation of the current SACU, His Majesty King Mswati III.
The 8th SACU Heads of State and Government Summit will be preceded by the meeting of the Council of Ministers taking place on 27 – 28 June 2023.
The Council of Ministers meeting will reflect and update on the status of the implementation of the SACU Strategic Plan 2022- 2027, of which the Heads of State and Government will provide political and strategic guidance.
The SACU Strategic Plan 2022- 2027, which will be in its first year of review since being adopted at the 7th SACU Heads of State and Government Summit is centred on six pillars, namely; Industrialisation, Export and Investment Promotion, Trade Facilitation and Logistics, Implementation and Leveraging of The AFCFTA Opportunities, Trade Relations/Unified Engagement with Third Parties, Finance and Resource Mobilisation and Effectiveness of SACU Institutions.
Established in 1910, SACU is the oldest Customs Union in the world and has since its agreed new dispensation by its five members states (Eswatini, Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia and South Africa) in 2002 assumed the status of an international organisation which facilitates compliance with the World Trade Organization treaty in pursuit of its goal of regional economic integration. President Cyril Ramaphosa will lead a delegation comprising Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition Ebrahim Patel, Minister of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development Thoko Didiza, Minister of Finance Enoch Godongwana and the South African Revenue Service Commissioner Edward Kieswetter.
