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13 April 2009

South African Foreign Minister Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma will later today, Monday 13 April 2009 depart for Sirte, Libya where she will lead a senior South African government delegation to the extraordinary African Union Council of Ministers meeting scheduled from 15 to 16 April 2009.

In this regard, Foreign Affairs Director-General Dr Ayanda Ntsaluba said, “This is a special meeting called to discuss the establishment of the African Union Authority or the transformation of the African Union Commission to the African Union Authority.”

“You will recall this was a decision of the January summit but this issue could not be concluded because of differences on the content and really of this authority and what it will in reality do. And so, a decision was taken and also to look at what implications the authority could have on the constitutive act because the understanding was that whatever changes are to take place to the commission the decision of heads of state was that it should be done within the context and framework of the current constitutive act. And off course, this authority was seen as another step towards the ideal in the medium to longer term of the establishment of the union government,” said Dr Ntsaluba.

“So, this meeting will be looking at such things as the function of the authority, the size of the authority, whether new commissioners would be established within the context of ongoing discussions that some of the commissioners have very wide mandates e.g. the commissioner for the social sector which covers about eight sectors which would be ministries in various member states, so that discussion will also deal with that while also looking at the financial implications of these decisions,” continued Dr Ntsaluba.

“This is likely to be a very robust meeting for the simple reason that as you would understand the formation of an authority was decided as a compromise between the points of view that wanted consolidation of the existing commission and those that wanted to move forward with the establishment of an African Union government immediately. It is obvious that in discussions regarding the authority, these streams of thought continue to come up because those who wanted to establish the union government want to pretend that the authority is that African Union government and want to load what is envisaged for the African Union government on that authority. So, I think it is going to be a very robust discussion but that is what will take place,” concluded Dr Ntsaluba.

Accordingly, the agenda of the AU Executive Council of Ministers will focus upon:
* implications of transforming the commission to an authority
* functions of the AU Authority
* size of the authority
* functions of the secretaries
* financial implications of establishing the African Union Authority.

Enquiries:
Ronnie Mamoepa
Cell: 082 990 4853

Issued by: Department of Foreign Affairs
13 April 2009