The President of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa has reaffirmed Africa’s determination to rise, with a call for fairer development and trade across the continent.
Speaking at the ongoing 80th session of the UN General Assembly in New York, President Ramaphosa urged global leaders to support Africa’s aspirations for peace and sustainable growth.
He said: “We must act decisively to silence all the guns everywhere to realise the goals of sustainable development and global peace, and I do believe that this is an objective that is possible to reach.”
President Ramaphosa pointed out that South Africa’s presidency of the Group of 20 (G20) marks the first time that the forum will convene a summit on the African continent “the cradle of humanity”.
According to him, “the summit focused on disaster resilience, debt sustainability for low-income countries, energy-transition financing and harnessing critical minerals for inclusive growth and sustainable development.”
“Africa is a continent irreversibly on the rise.
“Yet, many of the Sustainable Development Goals remain elusive due to a lack of financial resources many developing countries spend more on debt servicing than on health or education,” he explained.
President Ramaphosa underscored that the economic sanction against Cuba must be lifted “and we want it lifted sooner rather than later.”
He also said that the UN’s relevance is being wilfully undermined by a growing reliance on unilateral military action, citing the situations in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan and elsewhere.
President Ramaphosa stressed that Member States have a responsibility to ensure and protect Palestinians’ right to self-determination.
“There is a growing consensus that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza,” he said.
“We must reaffirm that freedom is indivisible, and that the denial of the rights of one person diminishes the freedom of all of us,” President Ramaphosa added.
NAN