President Levy Mwanawasa is tomorrow expected here, in Nairobi, Kenya for the 12th Common Market for Eastern and Southern African (COMESA) Head of State summit.
Zambian High Commissioner to Kenya Lieutenant General Solom Mumbi told the Zambian press here today that President Mwanawasa is schedule to arrive here at about 16:00 hours local time, which translates into 15: 00 Zambia time.
Lt. Gen. Mumbi said the Heads of State summit will run from May 22 to 23 and would
be held at the United Nations (UN) Complex in Gigiri, Kenya.
He said immediately after the closure of the summit, Mr. Mwanawasa is expected to
meet Zambians living in Kenya at the High Commissioner’s residence.
He said the summit whose theme is ” Deepening integration for diversification and
value addition” is expected to focus more on the four-band tariff agreement.
Lt. Gen. Mumbi said the tariff band agreement which include capital, raw, intermediate and finished material is likely to be crucial because it will have a lot of impact on some countries.
He said so far Commerce, Trade and Industry minister Felix Mutati, Gender and Women
minister Patricia Mulasikwanda and Transport and Communications minister Sara
Saifwanda were already in Kenya as an advance party while Foreign Affairs Minister
Mundia Sikatana was being awaited.
The meeting is also review the peace and security situation in the region, with particular emphasis on development in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Eritrea -Ethiopia border dispute, the situation in the Darfur region of Sudan, the conflict in northern Uganda and the situation in Somalia.
The meeting will also review the recently concluded DRC and Madagascar elections.
The meeting shall take into consideration, the impact of efforts by the United Nations (UN), the African Union (AU), the Inter- Governmental Authority on Development and the International Conference on the Great Lakes region to address these issues.
The meeting will also consider and adopt the report and recommendations of the 8 th meeting of the COMESA Committee on Peace and Security which met in Lusaka, Zambia,
from April 18 to 20 this year.
Zambia’s dual regional economic grouping membership to COMESA and SADC has been put to the test by the WTO requirement that the country must only opt for one.
A couple of weeks ago government said the decision as to which one to retain would be made sooner than later.
Does anyone know if this has been done?