UK based Free Zim Youth group to meet SADC chair

By Violet Gonda
6 November 2006

Last month they ambushed and disrupted a London meeting by the South African Foreign Minister Dr. Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, expressing their displeasure with South Africa’s handling of the Zimbabwean crisis. They have taken part in numerous demonstrations and they say they will continue to hound African delegates in the UK on the unfolding events in Zimbabwe. The diligence and determination of this energetic UK based pressure group, Free-Zim Youth, has resulted in a meeting with Southern African Development Community (SADC) officials. They will meet Lesotho officials in London on Wednesday to urge SADC to change their policy on the political and economic meltdown in Zimbabwe. This is significant because Lesotho’s Prime Minister Pakalitha Musisili is the current co-chairperson of SADC.

The youth activists said in a statement; “This is a follow up to the just ended SADC finance protocol summit in South Africa in which we feel member states are mocking our suffering by signing Zimbabwe to the trade protocol. Yet they know there is no economy to talk about due to bad policies, with no balance of trade.”

Spokesperson Alois Mbawara confirmed that the youths had been invited to a diplomatic meeting with Lesotho High Commission Officials. He said: “This is part of our diplomatic approaches trying to approach African countries, mainly SADC member states, in trying to present and project the Zimbabwean crisis and what we wish SADC members could do to end the humanitarian crisis in Zimbabwe.”