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Tendai Rupapa
Senior Reporter
FIRST LADY Dr Auxillia Mnangagwa yesterday received a high-powered Russian delegation that paid her a reciprocal visit at her Zimbabwe House offices expressing interest in various fields, including education, health, agriculture, mining and tourism as the benefits of her foreign visits bear fruit.
Dr Mnangagwa was in Moscow, Russia, in December last year where she was hosted by the Women’s Success International Association among many other organisations whom she invited to visit Zimbabwe and explore opportunities in various economic sectors.
Yesterday, the delegation led by Ms Elena Matveeva, the head of the International Centre of Business and Industrial Tourism, shared advanced plans to set up manufacturing plants, exchange programmes in mining and health, establish a special hospital for women equipped with the latest Russian equipment and a beauty Spa to promote medical tourism in the country, dovetailing with Dr Mnangagwa’s passion for the improvement of quality health services for women and children.
Dr Mnangagwa, who is Zimbabwe’s health ambassador, is currently building a mother and child hospital in Harare through her Angel of Hope Foundation.
She also constructed a health centre in Chiweshe.
Russian Ambassador to Zimbabwe Mr Nikolai Krasilnikov said the delegation, comprising officials representing government and non governmental institutions, came at the invitation of Dr Mnangagwa and was headed by Madame Matveeva whom the First Lady got acquainted to when she visited Moscow.
He said the visit by the delegation was a culmination of the fruitful engagements Amai Mnangagwa made in Moscow.
“In fact, today’s visit became possible due to the fruitful and productive visit of the First Lady to Moscow last year when her significant contribution to implementation of the humanitarian agenda was highlighted in all bright colours by the international forum in recognition of her tireless and very effective efforts for the benefit of the people of Zimbabwe within the framework of Angel of Hope Foundation.
“It was very remarkable that during her visit to Russia, she did not limit herself to specifically humanitarian efforts, but decided to explore new directions and spheres to seek advantages and opportunities for the socio-economic development of Zimbabwe.
“This is why in a follow-up to her conversations in Moscow, the delegation brought to her kind attention and consideration a number of proposals that can be implemented into mutually beneficial joint ventures.
“In my humble opinion they represent a low-hanging fruit that can be easily turned into tangible projects specifically in the areas of healthcare and tourism,” the Ambassador said.
Madame Matveeva, who is also the president of Women’s Success International Association, spoke glowingly of the meetings she had with Dr Mnangagwa towards the end of last year in Moscow and said she had an interest in organising training programmes for Zimbabwean doctors.
“In 2022, the First Lady of Zimbabwe Her Excellency Dr Auxillia Mnangagwa was invited to visit Russia. In Moscow, we had an honour to organise very important working meetings with her and to discuss cooperation development in such areas as tourism, medical activities, education, mining and agriculture. Today we had great honour and pleasure to have a working meeting with the First Lady in Zimbabwe.
“We had an opportunity to discuss the details of new technology, highly developed technology in the medical area, including surgery, reproductive system, child health and so on.
“Also one of our priorities is to contribute to training programmes of Zimbabwean doctors, medical staff as well.
“To organise different kinds of workshops, seminars, international roundtables for specialists in different areas particularly in health in order to exchange our opinions for the best technology for the Zimbabwean people, how to improve their health with Russian technology in medical equipment,” she said. Madame Matveeva said she would encourage Russian tourists to visit Zimbabwe to ensure they enjoyed the country’s good hospitality and warm population.
“We will encourage Russian tourists to visit Zimbabwe. Tourism is also one of our priority areas to develop between the two countries because the Republic of Zimbabwe is very attractive, very beautiful, the people are kind and you have wonderful nature. There are so many unique things for sight-seeing for our people of Russia.
“We would want to contribute greatly in order to promote tourism in Zimbabwe and to help to ensure more sustainable cooperation in this area.
“One more thing, to complement the First Lady’s efforts in the health sector, we want to establish a medical centre in Harare for the full medical treatment of any small reproductive problems with special attention to female health.
“The main activities of this clinic will be mainly dedicated to the women, their health, their beauty, their wellness. This project was going to be unique, not only for the people of Zimbabwe but for the whole of Africa.
“We will do our best in order to contribute to its establishment and we will provide our best technology to make this centre the best on the whole continent. We also got proposals to establish a Spa centre for beauty procedures which will help attract more tourists for Zimbabwe, for medical tourism. We take this opportunity to express our deepest gratitude to the First Lady for her hospitality and for the invitation to come and discover for ourselves the great country,” she said.
“We can see that Zimbabwean people are great, kind, supportive and to be here it’s a great pleasure. Your nature, people and the environment are friendly to any person. We visited the First Lady’s Mother and Child hospital which is under construction and we were impressed by the work of Her Excellency the First Lady. Her contribution in order to improve the medical situation, to provide a hospital is commendable. Her title “Mother of the nation” resonates well with the works she is undertaking in Zimbabwe,” she added.
Mr Yuri Petrovich, the Rector of the Russian State University for Geological Prospecting, who was part of the high-powered delegation said Zimbabwe and Russia had made significant progress in implementing an inter-ministerial agreement on education, research and innovation.
“I am very impressed by your country and the hospitality of the people. One of the priorities of today’s visit is that we have started implementation of the inter-ministerial agreement signed earlier between the two national ministers of Education, Research and Innovation of Zimbabwe and the Russian Federation. During the First Lady’s visit to Moscow, we had the honour to present to Her Excellency the establishment of the Mineral Resource Centre at the University of Zimbabwe.
“We are working hard with the Rector of the University of Zimbabwe on implementation and establishment of this centre as soon as possible. We have already examined the place where the centre is going to be established. Another priority direction for us is to provide high quality training programmes for Zimbabwean students in different areas in the geology and mining perspective. During the current meeting with Her Excellency, I had the honour to provide an official invitation for Zimbabwean children to visit Russia in the final project of the construction of a schoolchildren centre to come and participate in different activities including geology and mining. We are sure that cooperation started recently will be developed successfully and will bring fruitful results to both countries,” Mr Petrovich said.
Mr Alexander Boksha, the founder of Relict Organics, which manufactures organic fertiliser, said he had spoken on the need to introduce his fertilisers which were both efficient and eco-friendly.
“I represent a group of Russian companies which produce organic fertiliser. We spoke of this technology in our working meeting with the First Lady. Using this organic fertiliser helps to save soil and to improve the quality of soil to make it friendly to human health. We assure that using organic fertiliser can be useful and eco-friendly if used as an industry and for private planting. We can use two words to describe it, efficient and eco-friendly. I have seen many friendly people in Zimbabwe,” he said.
Another member of the delegation, Ms Allia Shalamberidze, the director of Zaffiro Clinics, expressed gratitude to Dr Mnangagwa for inviting her to Zimbabwe.
“I am also a member of the successful women club. I am very grateful to Her Excellency for giving me this invitation to visit her today. I am impressed by Zimbabwe and its people and by nature. We are in long-term sustainable development of medicine and I am sure that our joint activities will help to improve the national health system of Zimbabwe as well. We are founding the clinic for Zimbabwean women. The mission of the clinic will be to make Zimbabwean women even more healthier. The clinic will cover many areas of female health and female reproductive system, aesthetics and cosmetology. This hospital will be specialised for women’ s health. The idea was from the First Lady to create such a hospital in Zimbabwe after she visited a similar facility in Moscow,” she said.
In her remarks, Dr Mnangagwa expressed delight that the Russians had honoured the invitation she extended to them.
She highlighted the empowerment projects she was undertaking in her quest to improve livelihoods in general and the welfare of women in particular.
“I invited you to come to Zimbabwe so that you see what Zimbabwe has in terms of business, natural resources, wildlife etc. When I came to Moscow, it was all about Angel of Hope Foundation, what it does focusing on the vulnerable groups mainly women and girls, the underprivileged including those with disabilities, the aged, widows, widowers and child headed families. As AOH we are empowering women and the girl child. One of the many empowerment projects I am running with for women is Agric4She. All we want as women, as mothers is food security from household level. Zimbabwe is agro-based therefore all hands should be on the deck. Zimbabwe is also into tourism, mining, construction and our women are also involved in all those sectors. There is need to involve these women for business opportunities. I am behind them pushing them up because I want to see them grow from strength to strength,” she said.
Dr Mnangagwa invited the delegation to meet relevant ministries under the Zimbabwe Investment and Development Agency (ZIDA).
“You will have all the services under one roof for possible cooperation. We need more business partners to come to Zimbabwe as President Cde Dr ED Mnangagwa is always saying that Zimbabwe is open for business. When you go back, you will tell other potential investors what you would have seen and heard,” she said.
The First Lady thanked the delegation for visiting her AOH mother and child hospital in Harare which is under construction.
“I am also the ambassador of Health and cooperation in the health sector will be much appreciated in terms of equipment and knowledge transfer. Your coming here has opened ways and doors. I would want to see all the proposals coming to fruition,” she said.
As the Environment and Tourism Patron, the First Lady invited the delegation to visit Victoria Falls which they accepted.
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