Your Excellency, Deputy Prime Minister Björklund
Members of the Swedish and South African Delegations
Ladies and gentlemen
Your Excellency, we are pleased to honour your invitation and wish to thank you for the warm welcome extended to me, and the members of my delegation, by the government and people of Sweden.
I am happy to preside jointly with you over the seventh meeting of the Bi-national Commission, another milestone in our strategic cooperation since it was inaugurated by our former leaders President Mbeki and Prime Minister Persson during the South African – Swedish Partnership Week in 1999.
I therefore wish to express my personal appreciation, as well as that of the South African Government, for the constructive spirit of cooperation and friendship that has been demonstrated throughout the preparations for this important bilateral meeting.
Based on our commitment to a long-term vision and mutual interests, South Africa finds this Bi-national Commission invaluable and reaffirms our total commitment to work with the Swedish government to achieve this objective.
Your Excellency;
Since our last meeting almost two years ago, the international arena has changed significantly; and thus our deliberations are taking place during extraordinary times.
As you are aware, we have witnessed various challenges arising out of social conflicts in North Africa and some countries in Middle East; thus adding new challenges to an already burdened multilateral system of governance.
These challenges are further compounded by uncertainties in the global economy and their negative impact, requiring that we all work together to develop a response.
The South African government would like to reaffirm the importance of continuing to mount an international humanitarian effort to tackle global poverty.
In this regard, Deputy Prime Minister, our joint commitment to stability, progress and sustainable development, should serve as the basis for equal and constructive partnerships in our multilateral efforts.
Accordingly we acknowledge your government’s continued support for institution building in Africa.
We are happy that we can count on the support of your country in fulfilling our vision to make the 21st century, the African Century.
Your Excellency;
The trade between our economies offers many growth opportunities for increased investment and technical cooperation.
While two-way trade between our countries has grown remarkably in the past few years there is still great potential for further growth and to balance trade.
Our countries share a number of interests in various areas such as education, research and development; investment in food processing; and developing the green economy to create jobs and to mitigate the effects of climate change.
We also hope that this meeting will unlock further opportunities for cultural exchanges in order to promote our respective Tourism industries and to strengthen our people to people contact.
I am aware that we are both determined to review the implementation of commitments made before and to develop further programmes of cooperation between our countries.
We hope that at the end of this visit we would have completed a clear roadmap to take us forward on the enhancement of our political and economic relations.
With these few words, I look forward to innovative and productive discussions over the next two days, and hope that they will contribute to taking this valuable bilateral mechanism to new heights.
I thank you.
