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P. Mavimbela: Address to Peace Summit 2023, Session IV-A
Written by Hon. Petros Vusi Mavimbela, speaker, Parliament of Eswatini
Wednesday, May 3, 2023
Address to Peace Summit 2023
May 2-5, 2023
I am from the kingdom of Eswatini. I think I am the only one here from the kingdom. Your Excellencies, dear delegates, before we can proceed, I have just one question. First and foremost, we need to ask ourselves: What do we mean by global order? The answer is simple. It emphasizes the international system for the maintenance of peace and security in pursuing and sustaining global order.
Your Excellencies, power politics and the failure to maintain global order and political realism has stepped into the field of the ideological curve exposed in the perceived limitation of idealism. Political realism conceptualizes international relations as a realm in which power politics is fundamental, if not all encompassing. Your Excellencies, corruption and nepotism, patriarchal societies, pandemics, violence and political unrest exacerbate and infringe on the culture of global peace.
Your Excellencies, with the COVID-19 pandemic, Africa has seen such effects as an increase and spread of anger, especially among youth. There has been high cases of unemployment, a rise in retrenchment, a rise in poverty, a high crime rate and health and mental unwellness. Loyalty to all governance systems has been affected [reflected] in high political unrest, protests and more. We are seeing the culture of peace deteriorating day by day.
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Let us look at the insurgence in Mozambique, where politics and power play issues have resulted in excessive killings of the girl child, some of whom have been mutilated in all forms. Gender-based violence has been rife. There have been regional interventions.
Our neighbor in Africa, Nigeria, faced the issue with the Boko Haram girls. We have seen a deprivation of education for and the painful incidence of the girl child in which sexual assault and gender based-violence has subjected them to early motherhood and more. The perpetrators are still on the run insisting on their manifesto of abuse. On the Rwandan genocide, the most compelling failure of the United Nations Security Council to not prevent and manage a crisis was the Rwandan genocide of April 1994.
The Security Council was in a position to intervene through a range of instruments to prevent the crisis from escalating to a genocide, given the fact that the governments of the permanent five members of the council were informed of the crisis on the January 12, 1994 by General Romeo A. Dallaire, the force commander of the UN Assistance Mission for Rwanda.
We have, your Excellencies, the issues in Sudan, which everyone here is aware of. It is current and running. Your Excellencies, as I conclude, regional organizations such as the European Union, African Union, the Organization of American States, the Association of the Southeast Asia Nations, the Organization of the Islamic Conference, and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe have an important role to play in pursuing global order. Specifically, article 52 of chapter eight of the UN Charter states that the Security Council shall encourage the development of pacific settlement of local disputes through such regional arrangements or by such regional agencies, either on the initiative of the state concerned or by reference from the security concern.
However, when conditions on the ground are not conducive to the operation of peace and security, for example, in the situation where armed militia are still projecting violence, then regional organizations generally have to defer to the Security Council, which has the power to authorize robust engagement with the armed groups, if necessary. Structure betrayed co-option and corruption needs to be dealt with in Africa.
Your Excellencies, I thank you.
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