STATEMENT BY THE RT HON PRIME MINISTER
MR AMBROSE M. DLAMINI
AT THE OPENING OF THE CROSS BORDER MEETING BETWEEN THE KINGDOM OF ESWATINI AND THE REPUBLIC OF MOZAMBIQUE
AT ESIBAYENI LODGE
ON MONDAY 26 NOVEMBER 2018
Your Royal Highnesses
Honourable Ministers
Your Excellencies members of the diplomatic corps
Deputy Attorney General of Mozambique
UNICEF Resident Representative
Director of Save the Children
Principal Secretaries
Members of the Prevention of People Trafficking and People
Smuggling from the two countries
Senior Government officials
Distinguished guests
Ladies and Gentlemen
It is my honour, on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, to welcome you all to the cross border coordinating meeting between the Kingdom of Eswatini and the Republic of Mozambique.
A special welcome is extended to our visitors from Mozambique who are joining us to strategise and implement a coherent fight against a common enemy which continues to enslave people around the world.
The Kingdom of Eswatini ratified the United Nations Convention on Transnational Organised Crime in September 2012, ensuring that it recognizes the benefits of harmonious international relations and cooperation. This Convention encourages Member States to cooperate and conclude bilateral or multilateral agreements and arrangements that enhance, amongst others, the effectiveness of law enforcement action to combat offences committed in one or more States.
Today we are seeing the implementation of the provisions of this Convention as Eswatini and Mozambique convene in such a forum to develop and agree on cooperation mechanisms with the intention to prevent, protect and assist citizens that may fall prey to people traffickers and smugglers within our two countries. We should be cognisant of the fact that people trafficking and people smuggling is a threat to our internal security.
People trafficking and people smuggling, like the heinous crime it is, knows no borders or boundaries. It is a scourge that has persisted across the world for many years and continues to wreck havoc in the lives of the most vulnerable in society, especially women and children.
It is perpetuated by money-seeking individuals or groups often relying on deceit and dishonesty pretending to be what they are not. More often than not, it ends with violence or sexual abuse. No wonder it is referred to as modern slavery.
The Kingdom of Eswatini has made many strides and interventions in the fight against this scourge, but more waits to be done. Public education on the symptoms, identification and effects of human trafficking and smuggling continues to be intensified across the country. Enabling legislation has been promulgated and Government continues to strengthen the capacity of the inter-agency task force established to coordinate the efforts of combating this unacceptable human behaviour.
Combating trafficking in persons is relevant to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, specifically the target of eradicating forced labour and human trafficking. As countries and neighbours, we need to work in collaboration to facilitate safe, responsible and orderly migration across our borders in order to decrease profit opportunities for migrant smugglers and human traffickers.
To this end, we need to be aware that both our countries can be the source, transit or destination points for traffickers and smugglers. This means we have to deal with realities of being recipients or transit points of victims of crime, hence the need to come out with appropriate interventions and cooperation agreements.
As you proceed with this one and half day workshop may I plead that you conduct these deliberations fully aware of the three crucial pillars you need to embrace – prevention, protection and prosecution. It is important that victims are quickly identified, perpetrators investigated and prosecuted, and that services required by the victims are availed. The final product of this meeting should be a feasible coordination mechanism that recognizes and meets the standards of good international relations and cooperation.
On behalf of His Majesty’s Government, may I now declare the cross border coordination meeting on people trafficking and people smuggling between the Kingdom of Eswatini and the Republic of Mozambique officially opened.
Thank you.