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Mukudzei Chingwere in JOHANNESBURG, South Africa
Vice President Dr Constantino Chiwenga has arrived in Johannesburg, South Africa, to represent President Mnangagwa at the BRICS summit, which opened yesterday.
Leaders of the economic grouping among them President Xi Jinping of China and host President Cyril Ramaphosa, and others met yesterday to plot the future of the economic block amid growing interest from other countries, particularly developing countries, to join the grouping.
VP Chiwenga left Harare soon after casting his vote in the ongoing general elections.
“I am here in South Africa to represent His Excellency the President Dr Cde Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa to the BRICS meeting which, as you know, has already started,” said VP Chiwenga.
“We will be participating in it from this evening to tomorrow, and I will deliver the President’s address,” said the Vice President.
In an earlier interview, President Mnangagwa said he was unable to attend the summit but would send someone to represent him.
“It’s a pity, my dear brother Cyril (Ramaphosa) was persuading me in Rwanda, to come on the 23rd and 24th of August, but I told him I am in the middle of elections,” said President Mnangagwa in an earlier interview with journalists.
“He did his best to convince me, but I said my brother, this one, no. I may send somebody to represent me.
“This because as Zimbabwe, we have also applied to join the BRICS Bank and a second level we may also want to join BRICS as a country and not just the bank,” said President Mnangagwa.
Online Reporter