Month: August 2023

An Angolan expert in Foreign Affairs has described the implementation of the guidelines of the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) as crucial during Angola’s rotating presidency in the regional organisation.

Conceição Vaz told the Angola’s National Radio Station (RNA) that during its presidency, the country will need to give a further boost to the implementation of the actions, including transparency and good governance.

Speaking ahead of the 43rd Summit of SADC Heads of States and Governments that takes place on 7 – 17 August in Luanda, the expert mentioned the strengthening of the economies of the member States as one of the challenges of the Angolan presidency.

SADC groups Angola, Botswana, Comoros, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Eswatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Angola takes over the SADC’s chair this month for a one-year term, after having done so in 2012.

DRC´s President Félix Tshisekedi is currently at the helm of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) .

Source: Angola Press News Agency (APNA)

Angolan Government is improving the priorities to be included in the National Development Plan (PDN 2023/2027), a document that will guide the National Planning System bodies toward the preparation of activities and projects to be implemented.

PDN is a medium-term planning instrument, which comes up with the strategic goals by domain and respective action programmes, goals, projects and activities.

According to the Secretary of State for Planning, Milton Reis, the technical and ministerial meetings are currently taking place to improve the projects to be implemented over the next four years.

Speaking at the usual briefing of the Ministry of Economy and Planning (MEP), Milton Reis reiterated that the PDN will be analysed and appreciated in a session of the Cabinet Council this month (August).

“The calendar defines that we will take the approval of this important instrument of governance in the Meeting of the Cabinet Council in August”, said the official, to whom “the filters are fundamental, because they will allow us to establish priorities”.

He admitted the need to focus on the most important ones, looking at budgetary restrictions, an exercise that he considers to be “in the final stretch”.

The preparation of PDN is based on ELP – (Long-Term Strategy) Angola 2050, an instrument, approved by Cabinet Council on July 26t, awaiting its publication in the country’s Gazette.

Source: Angola Press News Agency (APNA)

Israeli ambassador to Angola Shimon Saloman commended Thursday the role of the water transfer system from the Cunene river, in the Cafu region, in agriculture and fighting against drought in the communities.

The diplomat made the praise at the end of a visit to assess the operation of the pumping center on the Cafu channel, stating that it is a project with enormous potential for the benefit of the communities.

Shimon Saloman said the investment will bring “great benefits” soon, both for rural families who live more than 160 kilometers from the province, and for other families in neighbouring countries.

However, he defended the need to take more advantage of the investment, stressing that the population has free access to water for consumption, agriculture and livestock.

Like Israel, which has scant water resources for agriculture, the diplomat defends the development of technologies to encourage agricultural production by families.

As for diplomatic relations between the two States, the diplomat said several Angolan delegations travel to Israel to exchange experiences, especially in the sector linked to agricultural production, water and cyber security.

Source: Angola Press News Agency (APNA)

A new ant species named Ponera adumbrans, which means obscuring or silhouetting in Latin, has been discovered on two islands of Seychelles; Silhouette and Mahe.

According to the authors of a study in the journal “Organisms Diversity & Evolution,” the name refers to the obscure origin of this species in the Malagasy region and the type of locality on Silhouette Island.

According to Pat Matyot, a trustee of the Silhouette Foundation, “This type of ant is very rare that most people will never see it. Its DNA is different from that of the other 80 species of ants recorded in Seychelles.”

The new species does not yet have a Seychellois Creole, English, or French name and American myrmecologist Brian Fisher, who first collected the specimen, is inviteing the people of Seychelles to nominate a name for the ant.

Specimens on which the description is based were collected by Fisher in January 2010 in leaf litter and rotten wood on the ridge leading to Mont Corgat on Silhouette Island. Another specimen was found on Mont Copolia on Mahe, the main island.

Fisher and his colleagues, including students, have been looking at the ants they collected all over the western Indian Ocean, and studying each group of related species in turn.

Although the specimens were collected from Seychelles in 2010, it is only now that they have been able to publish the description of this one.

Fisher was assisted by the staff of most of the environmental organisations in Seychelles. These included the Department of the Environment, the Seychelles Islands Foundation and the Island Conservation Society (ICS). ICS runs conservation programmes for the state-owned Islands Development Company on Silhouette and other islands of the archipelago.

Research has proven that this species is new to science and has never been found anywhere else in the world.

“Brian and his team are establishing a clear inventory of what ants are found in Seychelles. They are describing and naming species we did not know about before. In the end, we will have this inventory that will enable us to have a more precise picture of our ant fauna – the native species that need to be protected as well as the invasive alien (introduced) ones that we need to keep under control,” said Matyot.

He added that “ecologists and conservationists will benefit from the work done by Brian and his team. Other scientists will be able to focus on particular species and work out the details of their biology.”

The experts say that this species of ant does not present a threat to other species and “the fact that it is rare and found in only a couple of higher altitude places suggests that this ant itself could be vulnerable to invasive ants such as the big-headed ant (pti fourmi rouz gro latet in Creole) and the yellow crazy ant (fourmi Maldiv in Creole) and the destruction of native vegetation may be a serious threat to them as well,” said Matyot.

Fisher, who is interested in the origin and radiation of ants in the Southwest Indian Ocean (SWIO) across the different island groups, said that Seychelles is unique in that many ant genera show a relationship with Asian ant fauna. In contrast, other island systems show a stronger relationship with Africa.

“We still have over 10 new species to describe from the island. One species, Stigmatomma besucheti, from La Digue, has not been collected since its original collection. I must return to find this new species,” said Fisher.

The Island Conservation Society (ICS) says that a new species further highlights that Silhouette is a biodiversity hotspot.

“It also shows that hidden gems like this new species can still be discovered on an island like Silhouette -as its challenging topography makes for equally challenging conservation explorations, and therefore there is still plenty to potentially be discovered on Silhouette,” said Nasreen Khan, a conservation officer of ICS on Silhouette.

The ICS team will be embarking on an expedition with the Seychelles National Herbarium and with the Plant Conservation Action (PCA) group to undertake exploration on rare plant species. Among these will be collecting invertebrate samples.

“If we do find this species on another side of the island, it would be adding more detail to the limited knowledge we have, moreover it would also be exciting to have collected a sample of the new species, 13 years after Brian Fisher,” said Khan.

Source: Seychelles News Agency

All parties involved in the spanner crab fishing sector in Seychelles were updated on work being carried out by the local fishing authority in a workshop on Thursday.

The workshop is part of a collaboration with The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) under the International Climate Initiative (IKI) grant.

Participants also had the opportunity to give their feedback to help local authorities formulate fisheries management regulations.

The Seychelles Fishing Authority (SFA) has been working on the Seychelles spanner crab fishery by applying FishPath as a tool.

FishPath is an approach to make the fisheries sector sustainable by adopting a bottom-up approach to fisheries management and has so far been applied in 17 countries spanning over 45 fisheries.

Seychelles is among other island states in the Indian Ocean that have received a grant from the German government through The Nature Conservancy, headquartered in Virginia, the United States.

“The grant has two objectives; one is working on the tuna industry and the second is the FishPath,” Seychellois fisheries expert at TNC, Ameer Ebrahim, told reporters.

Participants also had the opportunity to give their feedback to help local authorities formulate fisheries management regulations. (Seychelles Fishing Authority) Photo License: CC-BY

The first two fisheries to be targeted under the FishPath component are lobster and spanner crab fisheries.

Ebrahim, who is also the focal person for the project, said that the lobster and spanner crab fisheries were identified as needing a bit more attention in a consultative process in 2019.

He also explained that it will also develop a fisheries management plan.

Ebrahim said that some people may think this is something negative that will stop people from fishing.

“This could not be further from the truth because if a management plan is properly implemented, it takes into account all the aspects of fisheries – economic, social and the environment,” he explained.

As part of the FishPath project, SFA personnel are being trained to develop a plan that will be useful to everyone and not just those working in offices.

The workshop on Thursday concentrated on the spanner crab fisheries, as there have been new developments in that kind of fishing. SFA has carried out a survey of species on the Mahe Plateau, which provided an idea of the distribution of the species there.

It was also an opportunity for the SFA officials to receive the feedback of other parties involved, which will help in drafting its upcoming sea life framework.

At the launching of the event, the Minister for Fisheries and the Blue Economy, Jean-Francois Ferrari, said, “We want to ensure that everyone can fish today and that own children and grandchildren can do so tomorrow.”

The meeting was also a chance for the authorities to build better communication and trust with the fishers and showcase the importance of practising or proactively managing a resource.

Now that the authorities have made the step at strengthening relationships, communications, and information flow between fishers and SFA, the input provided will be used when drafting the various aspects of formal fisheries management.

Source: Seychelles News Agency

Two days after the press briefing by the Deputy Spokeman for the United Nations Secretary-General Farhan Haq, in which he criticised the Tunisian authorities’ treatment of sub-Saharan migrants in Tunisia, Interior Minister Kamel Feki gave a statement to TAP news agency on Thursday to take stock of a number of key points.

The Minister stated that what has just been published by certain international organisations, in particular by the UN Secretary-General deputy spokesperson on August 1, 2023, on the need to protect African refugees and migrants at the Tunisian border, are “imprecise” and are more akin to “untruths”.

He added that the allegations and claims of arbitrary expulsion operations are completely unfounded, calling on the UN bodies verify the information before rushing to publish it.

In this respect, he warned against the harmful repercussions of the publication of such erroneous information on the performance and actions of the security services, which, he said, spare no means and no effort in lending a helping hand to irregular migrants stranded at Tunisia’s land and sea borders.

Backed by figures, the Minister of the Interior reported that more than 15,327 irregular migrants had been rescued by the Tunisian security forces between January and July 2023, 95% of whom were nationals of sub-Saharan African countries.

The Minister of the Interior also reaffirmed the Tunisian state’s commitment to respecting human rights and stressed that he was closely monitoring the humanitarian treatment and actions of the security forces on the ground, in coordination with the relevant international organisations, in particular the Tunisian Red Crescent.

In response to the UN’s “allegations” regarding the expulsion of illegal African migrants, the Minister clarified that this matter was being dealt with in accordance with Tunisian law and in compliance with the provisions of international treaties, adding that the Tunisian State could in no way be held responsible for events outside its territorial borders.

He also pointed out that the “untruths” spread by certain media could in no way be attributed to the Secretary-General of the United Nations, who he described as “a person of integrity, honesty, firmness and professionalism, with proven competence in diplomatic and international customs and practices. “

However, Minister Fekih made it clear that the sovereignty of states and the protection of their territories could no longer depend on “inaccurate and imprecise” statements made by third-level officials of the UN organisation.

He reaffirmed that this “media outcry” could in no way affect or damage the fraternal relations between Tunisia and its Libyan and Algerian brothers, just as it could in no way diminish the determination and commitment of the Tunisian security services to vigorously combat the threat of terrorism, smuggling and trafficking in human beings, and to confront anything that could harm human dignity.

Source: Agence Tunis Afrique Presse

President Kais Saied met with Prime Minister Ahmed Hachani at Carthage Palace on Thursday afternoon to discuss the progress of the government’s work.

According to a statement issued by the presidency, the meeting focused on the need to make progress in ridding the administration of those who have infiltrated it and have become an obstacle to the completion of all economic, social and other projects.

Many projects are ready, the funds allocated for them are available and all that is lacking is the sincere will to implement them, the statement said.

The President of the Republic noted that «the administration is full of highly qualified people, but many of those who refused to serve only the homeland and the state were excluded.»

Source: Agence Tunis Afrique Presse