The second African Union (AU) summit in Maputo was drawing to a close on Saturday after two days of deliberation where heads of state elected new leaders responsible for the day-to-day running of the organisation.
The assembly appointed five women and two men as commissioners
to the AU Commission, similar to that of the European Commission.
The AU Constitution requires that at least half the commissioners be women. Since the chair and his deputy are men, five out of the remaining seven commissioners elected on Friday evening were women.
Former Malian president Alpha Oumar Konare will head the commission and Patrick Mazimhaka, Rwanda’s minister for the Great Lakes region, is his deputy. He will step down from his ministerial post.
The newly elected team, with representatives from all five regions in Africa, will take up their positions in September.
The setting up of the commission, which was managed by interim chairman Amara Essy of Côte d’ Ivoire in the first year of the AU’s existence, is crucial to getting AU institutions up and running.
The summit placed defence matters and the establishment of a Peace and Security to tackle some 20 conflicts across the continent high on its agenda.
The implementation of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (Nepad), a social and economic recovery plan promising good governance and democracy in exchange for more aid from the developed world was also a key theme of the gathering.
But South African Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad said on Friday evening heads of state had decided to hold two extraordinary summits on Nepad and defence.
”A draft framework has been circulated to leaders here. It covers several themes including defence and security … This is work in progress that has to go to defence ministers, foreign ministers and legal experts,” Pahad said.
He added that the progress report on Nepad was ”upbeat”.
”The leaders decided we need a summit to deal with short-term infrastructure and agricultural development policies now in implementation phase,” Pahad said.
The three-day summit will end in Maputo, the capital of Mozambique, whose President Joachim Chissano is taking over the revolving AU chairship from his South African counterpart President Thabo Mbeki. – Sapa-AFP