COMESA to review conflict prevention, peacebuilding strategies in member states

The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) has been awakened by the urgent need to review conflict prevention and peacebuilding strategies in its member states.

COMESA secretary General, Chileshe Kapwepwe, said two developments in the region had caught the attention and re-ignited the urgent need to review the conflict prevention and peacebuilding strategies which had been employed in recent times.

Kapwepwe said at the eighteenth meeting of the COMESA committee on peace and security on Wednesday that the first development was the situation in Sudan, which had captured the attention of the continent and beyond.

She mentioned that it was particularly concerning that the conflict came at a time when it seemed that the stakeholders were converging to a consensus which led to the signing of a Framework Agreement on 5th December 2022.

“This was followed by negotiations with impressive results towards the implementation of the Agreement that continued until early April this year.

“With this sudden escalation, I believe it is time for us to carefully consider the critical factors of the conflict and to review the strategies employed towards consensus building so that all relevant stakeholders fully own the decisions made,” Kapwepwe said.

She also pointed out that COMESA had continued to work within the niche, saying the focus area, which addressed the economic and structural dimensions of conflicts exploits COMESA’s areas of comparative advantage.

Kapwepwe said COMES had made efforts to forge strategic partnerships to enhance synergies and maximise the efficient use of resources.

During the meeting, Kapwepwe presented various reports to the delegated such as reports on the progress made on the implementation of conflict early warning system.

“We are pleased at the continued uptake of the use of this model during the reporting period with the inclusion of Mauritius and Seychelles.

“We have also continued our training programme which is targeted at countries that have started to engage with the model and we shall be delighted to include these two countries in the training programmes,” she said.

The second report presented covered the implementation of programmes developed to address conflict prevention and management during the reporting period.

Kapwepwe said this past year, COMESA had enhanced its engagement to support the youth play a bigger role in peace and security.

“We have also taken greater interest in the plight of children affected in armed conflicts.

“Our approach in engaging the youth has been two pronged, firstly to build their capacity to engage regional and continental bodies towards the objectives of silencing the guns; and secondly to support the development of national action plans on the youth peace and security agenda,” she said.

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