Former IEBC chairman Wafula Chebukati has been invited to give an address at the 25th Annual General Conference Symposium of the Electoral Commissions Forum in South Africa.
The meeting, which brings together Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries, will be held in Cape Town.
SADC is a Regional Economic Community comprising 16 member States.
“I am delighted to have been invited to the 25th Annual General Conference Symposium of the Electoral Commissions Forum of SADC Countries to make a presentation on "Delivering elections with integrity and trust," Chebukati said on X.
SADC has been in existence since 1980, when it was formed as a loose alliance of nine majority-ruled States in Southern Africa known as the Southern African Development Coordination Conference (SADCC), with the main aim of coordinating development projects in order to lessen economic dependence on the then apartheid South Africa.
The founding member States are: Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
The transformation of the organisation from a Coordinating Conference into a Development Community (SADC) took place on August 17, 1992 in Windhoek, Namibia when the Declaration and Treaty was signed at the Summit of Heads of State and Government thereby giving the organisation a legal character.
The member States are Angola, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe
SADC headquarters are located in Gaborone, Botswana.
Among the SADC’s earliest priorities were projects to improve the existing rail and road networks between the member states so they could reduce their dependence on South African ports and transport routes for the shipment of their imports and exports.
These projects greatly improved the region’s transportation infrastructure.
With the advent of majority black rule in South Africa and that country’s membership in the SADC (1994), however, the focus of the organisation shifted toward greater regional economic integration.
