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Maxwell Tapatapa Herald Reporter
Zimbabwe will engage other African nations, and potentially including the African Union (AU) Council of Ministers Meeting, so that the continent acts and votes in one accord on matters affecting fellow countries.
This comes after Zimbabwe and other African countries recently made four important proposals on issues to do with the improvement of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) at the 19th CITES Conference held in Panama City last month, but were rejected after some African countries voted against them.
Speaking during a post-Cabinet briefing yesterday, Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services Minister Monica Mutsvangwa said Zimbabwe proposed an amendment to the voting procedure to assign several votes per representative, proportionate to the population size of the species under discussion or whose status is subject to voting.
“Some countries supported the proposal which was, however, rejected following a vote,” said Minister Mutsvangwa.
“The country proposed to remove the requirement that Zimbabwe’s elephants listed on Appendix II can only be traded to ‘acceptable’ destinations.
“The proposal had 15 members in favour, 83 against and 17 abstained.”
Minister Mutsvangwa added that the proposal on establishing a Rural Communities Committee received no consensus from members and an inter-sessional working group was set up to consider the issue and make recommendations to CITES.
Zimbabwe, in conjunction with Botswana, Namibia, Cambodia and Eswatini, submitted a proposal to include consideration of livelihoods and food security, but was also rejected.
After the rejection of Zimbabwe’s proposals and those made by fellow African countries, Harare has resolved to engage Africa so that it is always united in making and passing decisions as the former colonisers do.
“Given the divisions that continue to widen among African regions at CITES, Cabinet agreed that the matter be taken up through engagements with fellow African nations and, where possible discussed at the AU Council of Ministers Meeting so that Africa comes up with a common position devoid of the influence of the former colonial masters and civil society organisations,” said Minister Mutsvangwa.
During a question and answer session, Environment, Climate, Tourism and Hospitality Industry Minister Mangaliso Ndlovu said the failure to adopt Zimbabwe’s proposals mainly affected the SADC region, which was doing well in elephant conservation.
“The challenge of being a convention is that whatever decision is taken binds you all,” he said.
“We can’t be a SADC region with 85 percent of the elephant population and you get 15 percent deciding what goes and what doesn’t.
“It was disappointing that we had made proposals that we hoped will improve all the standing of CITES and the level of decision making at CITES, but it’s clear that there are people who are benefiting, especially from the NGO sector, who will lobby and use many other means to make sure that any transformation of CITES is either delayed or stopped.
“If you look at our four key proposals, really, they were meant to improve CITES.”
Minister Ndlovu said Africa had not been working together for a long time, a situation which had to be addressed.
“We have not been really finding each other in this platform and it’s unfortunate because we have an African Group of Negotiators in climate change,” he said.
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