meeting with President Kikwete of Tanzania, at Presidential Guesthouse
7 April 2006
Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen of the press.
First of all let me say Iâm very happy indeed to have President Kikwete with
us here. When we went to Dar-es-Salaam for the inauguration in December 2005,
the President indeed had said he would want to come here on a working visit so
that we can look at a variety of matters.
As you can see he is a working man, he came to work not for ceremony. And
one of the matters that weâve agreed with the President is to make sure that we
move on the implementation of an old decision between Tanzania and South
Africa, which has to do with what we have established - a Presidential Economic
Co-operation Commission to look at the matter of the detailed economic
co-operation between Tanzania and South Africa, to make sure that we activate
that commission.
We are looking at possibly June for its first working meeting. It had an
inaugural meeting here but its next working meeting should be in Tanzania
sometime in June, because we are very keenly interested in this matter of
increasing the economic relations between the two countries and addressing
these common challenges of development and poverty in both countries.
That commission should also help us, among other things, to address issues
that have to do with the trade imbalance between Tanzania and South Africa;
trade is very heavily weighted in favour of South Africa, we need to do
something about that, which should include encouraging larger volumes of
investment by South African companies in Tanzania.
Already South Africa is, I think, the fourth largest foreign investor in
Tanzania and there is no particular reason why South Africa should not be
number one in terms of foreign investors in Tanzania. And thatâs precisely part
of the process of improving the productive capacity of the country which would
have an impact on the matter of trade. Thatâs an important matter and I think,
as I was indicating, we are quite committed to making sure that we move with
regard to that commission so that we can address all of these detailed matters
that relate to that economic co-operation.
I donât know, but members of the media might know this, that already we have
something in the order of 150 South African companies in Tanzania that I think
shows the positive attitude that we are very pleased about from the investor
position here in South Africa towards Tanzania. But of course we are able
together with the President to look into other matters.
We are very pleased with the work that the President has been doing with
regards to solving this one outstanding problem of peace in Burundi which is a
matter of ensuring that the Palipehutu - Forces for National Liberation
(Palipehutu-FNL) comes into the peace process so that the shooting must end and
war come to an end and so on. And indeed the President has moved with regard to
that and in ensuring that the government and the FNL are able to interact so
that we solve this particular matter. It is critically important.
Of course weâve looked at other matters in the region including the
forthcoming elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and the
involvement of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) electoral
commissions in that process and we are ready to respond to other requests that
might come from the government of the DRC to support that process.
But finally let me say I was very glad that the President could come because
at least it gave us an opportunity for us to re-affirm the friendship with
Tanzania which, as you know, goes back many decades and to reaffirm our very
firm commitment to widening the bilateral relations between our two countries
in all areas. But again thank you very much Mr President and welcome.
Issued by: The Presidency
7 April 2006
