Online Reporter
The Herald Editor Victoria Ruzvidzo (VR) had a sit down with the Zimbabwean Ambassador to Türkiye Alfred Mutiwazuka (AAM) in Antalya, Türkiye, on the sidelines of the Antalya Diplomacy Forum (ADF) 2025 at the weekend. Issues discussed ranged from the global economy, regional economic integration and trade and investment between Zimbabwe and Türkiye. Below are excerpts of the interview.
VR: A very good afternoon to you, Ambassador. Nice to meet you here. So first and foremost, if you could give us the background of the ADF. What does it mean for Zimbabwe and for Africa at large?
AAM: Well, thank you very much. As Zimbabwe, we have been participating in the Antalya Diplomacy Forum here in Türkiye since its inception. This is the fourth one and we continue to participate.
The whole idea about our participation is that it provides us with an opportunity not only to network with government leadership here in Türkiye, but we are also able to meet business leaders, also those from think tanks, academics, and we also are able to interact with other global leaders from other countries and institutions of higher learning.
VR: Anything peculiar or specific about this year’s Forum?
AAM: Well, the theme of this year’s ADF is ‘reclaiming the space of diplomatic interaction’ because the thinking is that there is a lot of fragmentation in terms of diplomatic work.
You can see from the current events in the world that there is this element of countries now becoming more concerned about their national interests. They are more inward looking in terms of cooperation. We want to advance the issue of multilateralism.
We want it to be kept alive. And this ADF is trying to promote the issue of multilateralism, that all countries, all nations should be able to work together to solve the problems we have in the world, be it conflicts in some parts of the world, or be it in terms of our trade and economic relations, we need to come and work together as various nations of the world.
VR: I noticed some of the sessions are specifically on regional cooperation, maybe as the world tries to come together. And at this juncture, Zimbabwe is the chair of SADC. So how significant is this?
AAM: It’s very significant because in one of the sessions which we were participating, we were talking about regional integration, and we had EAC, we had SADC participation, and we are saying we should use these institutions to advance our economic interests because the issue of working together as countries in one region is paramount in terms of trade.
We have certain products in Zimbabwe which might be of use to another country, and we are saying we need to look more, because like I said, the issue of fragmentation in the world has really brought us together as SADC countries to say, this product, we used to find it in this part of the world, but we can’t find it. Is it better for us to go to Botswana or to Zambia or to South Africa to get this product so that we are able to integrate our economies that way?
VR: Maybe to take you home a bit. There are Zimbabweans at home interested in this particular forum, what would be the greatest take-aways that have come out of this?
AAM: I think as Zimbabweans what we can learn from this forum is that we need to understand its fundamental interests. The fact that Türkiye has been able to bring all these leaders from all over the world, presidents, vice presidents, think tanks, business leaders, I think it’s a lesson for Zimbabwe.
I was also of the view that even as African countries, starting even as SADC, we should have a similar forum where we meet as SADC countries, to brainstorm, to share ideas of how the bloc can advance our own interests. And I think as SADC chair, this is one of the proposals which should be tabled before we hand over the chairmanship to the next country. We should think of a forum or a think tank of this sort, of this nature, where as SADC we are able to bring in our professors, our politicians, even those ordinary people to say how can we move our agenda in the region? I think it’s very important. So there are lessons learned definitely in terms of the direction we can take.
VR: Great. If you don’t mind to delve a bit into relations between Zimbabwe and Türkiye, how would you describe them?
AAM: You might know that we opened the Zimbabwean embassy in Türkiye in 2019 and since then we have been trying to increase our economic and trade cooperation with the country and we have been very successful over the past six years or so. Just talking of the volume of trade, in 2019 we had about US$19 million, but now we are at US$45 million.
So there is considerable movement in terms of our goods and products moving in and out of this country but we need to do more. How do we do more? We are working on certain legal frameworks, agreements, memorandum of understanding for different sectors and as I speak to you, we have about 18 or 19 MOUs which are ready for signing in different sectors; mining, education, information, defence and so on.
And we are hoping that very soon we will be able to finalise and sign those agreements. It’s work in progress. We also have been able as an embassy to visit a number of provinces here in Türkiye
We thrive on our relationship with the Chambers of Commerce in Türkiye to ensure that we get more information of how we can advance and also bring our own products to this country. And in terms of the kind of products, goods we import or rather we export to Türkiye. We are exporting tobacco to this country.
We are also exporting sesame seeds and a number of minerals are coming to this country. But like I said, we can also do more. The Turkish side are very keen for the two countries to sign agreements so that we create that confidence for our investors, for our businesspeople and to create an environment that is good for them to bring their products to Zimbabwe.
Zimbabweans are buying textiles, electrical items here and machinery.
But again we need to do more and we have encouraged our business sector to come to Türkiye and participate in most of these trade and economic business forums which are held almost every three months. And we encourage even our Government officials to make time and visit Türkiye. And likewise, we also are in touch with the government of Türkiye to encourage them to visit Zimbabwe.
I know there is already a company which is in Zimbabwe right now from Türkiye which is looking at bringing heavy machinery equipment for road construction.
VR: Interesting. Thank you very much Ambassador.
AAM: It’s been a pleasure talking to you Editor.
