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The time to cling on to the presidency of the Pan-African Parliament (PAP) for good is over, as the Southern African region is confident of taking over the position through its candidate, Chief Fortune Charumbira, during elections slated for this month end in Midrand, South Africa.
The elections were aborted last year in May after the Southern Africa caucus insisted that the election of the president of the institution should rotate among the five regions of the African Union namely, North, West, East, Central and Southern Africa.
The AU, which includes all its organs, follows a principle of rotation within its leadership positions to unite the continent.
Speaking to journalists after meeting President Mnangagwa at State House in Harare yesterday, head of the delegation and SADC caucus campaign manager, Mr McHenry Venaani, said they were not only confident of victory, but would also deliver on their mandate to unite Africans for posterity.
“We are here to impress on the President of the country that we should consolidate our lobbying,” said Mr Venaani, a Namibian parliamentarian.
“We discussed the Pan-African Parliament presidency. It is Southern Africa’s time. We have achieved a mammoth achievement at the African Union that the principle of rotation that was denied to the Southern African region and other regions for a number of years was ventilated.
“And, the AU legal team agreed with us that there must be rotation.”
The PAP was set up to ensure full participation of all Africans in the economic development and integration of the continent.
Southern Africa is of the view that only the Northern and Southern regions should have presented candidates for president, because only these two are yet to have PAP presidency.
Mr Venaani said following the scheduling of elections for June 27 for the presidency, and July 8 for the Bureau of the Pan-African Parliament by the AU Heads of State, the SADC region agreed to rally behind Chief Charumbira.
“The thrust of the discussions was to consolidate under Chief Charumbira to accelerate our campaign in the next three weeks as we are going to hit the road campaigning throughout the region to consolidate our position and to go and deliver a united Africa,” he said.
Chief Charumbira is presently the PAP’s acting president.
Notwithstanding the myriad geo-political challenges confronting Africa, Mr Venaani said the continent should continue to follow the unifying path set out by the continent’s founding fathers such as Kwame Nkrumah and Haile Selassie.
“We want to use this opportunity to assure the rest of Africa that Southern Africa is not going to take a presidency that would want to hold on forever.
“We will abide by the principle of rotation. After we take it we will give it to another region, so that Africa continues to grow. And, we are not going to lead an Africa that is divided by –isms, regionalism, language barriers, and economic barriers.
“We are saying Africa is one.”
Mr Venaani and his team, which included South African National Assembly member and ANC chief whip, Pemmy Majodina, met in Harare last week to ramp up their campaign for Chief Charumbira after paying a courtesy call on Speaker of the National Assembly Advocate Jacob Mudenda.
Adv Mudenda attended yesterday’s meeting.
They had returned to apprise President Mnangagwa on their progress, as well as to iron out everything to keep the campaign on track.
The delegation is “stopping over to see other Presidents in the region and further afield” to consolidate their position. Herald
