Staff Reporter
President Cyril Ramaphosa says South Africa together with the Presidential Infrastructure Championing Initiative countries remain committed to ensuring the PICI is central to the success of the African Continental Free Trade Agreement, as well as the AU’s Agenda 2063.
Ramaphosa was presenting the PICI’s progress report to the Heads of State and Government in Ethiopia.
Earlier, Ramaphosa took the lead as the new chair of the AU’s peer review panel.
“As we collectively strive to meet our industrialization goals, infrastructure features heavily in Agenda 2063,” said Ramaphosa.
“The African Development Bank estimates that Africa’s infrastructure needs amount to some USD 130bn to USD 170bn a year. We need more dams, power plants, fibre optic cables and ports. But we also need more social infrastructure like roads, schools, public housing and clinics.”
Ramaphosa told heads of state and government that ’substantive and very good progress’ has been made on four multi-billion rand projects in southern Africa.
These include:
• The Beitbridge Border Post; connecting South Africa and Zimbabwe together with related road and rail infrastructure
• The Inga III Hydropower Project involving South Africa, the DRC, Namibia, Botswana and Angola
• The Lesotho Highlands Water Project – Phase II (LHWP) involving South Africa and Lesotho
• We are also positioning ourselves to become a hub for the manufacture and supply of Rail Stock for Africa, in line with the AU Resolution.
Said Ramaphosa: “The PICI must continue to play a key role in meeting the aspirations of Agenda 2063: of increasing intra and inter-regional trade, of promoting road, rail and port infrastructure in the region; of using financial institutions to collaborate with the private sector to expand on the continent; and of identifying and promoting practical opportunities for cooperation based on complementary national endowments.”
Ramaphosa also called on other African countries to join the African Peer Review.
“South Africa also looks forward to working together with you to persuade colleagues who are not yet members to join us,” said Ramaphosa.
“Our goal is to achieve universal accession to the APRM by 2023, as per the Decision of the Assembly of our Union. This APRM is our Mechanism. It is from Africa, out of Africa, and for Africa. Its ownership does not rest with a Secretariat, but with each of us.”
The APRM is a specialised agency of the AU, established in 2003 for the implementation of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (Nepad).
The agency is a self-assessment and self-monitoring agency that works on a voluntary basis, which means that member states volunteer to go through the review process.
During his acceptance as new AU chair, Ramaphosa thanked outgoing Egyptian president for holding forth and doing a sterling work during his term in office.
“I also thank my Brother, President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi for the outstanding and commendable manner in which he presided over the work of the AU during his term,” said Ramaphosa.
“South Africa first chaired the African Union (AU) following its historic re-launch in South Africa in 2002 when President Thabo Mbeki, who is here with us today, became chair of the AU. We are indeed deeply humbled to have been afforded the opportunity once again to lead this august continental body of governance, and by the confidence that has been vested in us today.”