MASERU – The Southern African Development Community (SADC) has restated total support for the freedom and independence of the Saharawi people, denouncing the illegitimate decolonization of the Western Saharan state by neighbours Morocco.
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Dec. 24, 2019
TEBOHO KHATEBE MOLEFI
3 min read
Regional bloc reaffirms Saharawi position
SADC representative at the Congress Jevin Pillay
This position the bloc declared before the 15th Congress of the Polisario Front on Sunday in Tirafiti (the liberated territories of the Western Sahara); the Polisario Front is a politico-military organization fighting to end Morocco’s control and occupation of Western Sahara.
SADC representative at the Congress, Jevin Pillay, said the bloc remained firm in its support to the “Saharawi people’s legitimate struggle for freedom and independence.”
“By attending the conference of the Polisario, the SADC wishes to reiterate its unwavering support for the realization of the Saharawi people’s inalienable right to self-determination, consistent with the UN Charter and the AU Constitutive Act,” he pointed out.
He recalled the principled position adopted by the SADC Summit of 2019, following the holding of the first Solidarity Conference with Western Sahara by the organization in of the same year.
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Southern African sister states Angola, Zimbabwe and South Africa also relayed a firm commitment and an unswerving stance with regard to the Sahrawi issue.
South Africa’s ruling African National Congress (ANC) said at the gathering that the country will remain on the side of the Saharawi in their struggle for freedom.
In a post Congress statement ANC national spokesperson, Pule Mabe, reinforced the former liberation movement’s pledge of continued solidarity with the Saharawi; and further called on the international community to expedite the resolution of the conflict in the area.
Speaking for the Angolan Liberation Front, Maria Sebastiao also called on the international community to ensure the implementation of UN resolutions on the decolonization of the Western Sahara, expressing her movement’s readiness to enhance relation and cooperation with the Polisario Front.
The Polisario Congress happens in the wake of a diplomatic blunder by the Lesotho foreign minister, Lesego Makgothi, who it turned out, visited Morocco on a solo crusade to overhaul Lesotho’s position on Western Sahara, and in particular the independence of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR).
Lesotho’s position of support for the independence of the SADR has, in recent times, been peppered with derision as in two statements in as many months deviated from a long standing state support for Western Sahara’s struggle for self-determination and recognition of the SADR against a decades-long occupation by Morocco.
Speaking after a national uproar in the wake of Makgothi’s bungle, the Minister of Communications Chief Thesele ‘Maseribane, pointed out that Lesotho has always been maintaining its integrity with regard to its foreign policy and that nothing has changed.
He said, based on Lesotho’s foreign policy, which has remained the same since obtaining independence, Lesotho has maintained her principled position to support the struggle for the people of Saharawi.
Representatives of different countries reiterated with one voice, during the Congress, their stable and unwavering position towards the right of the Saharawi people to exercise its right to self-determination.
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