Teasing out the Organ139

Should the SADC Organ on Politics, Defence and Security wish to interact with the OAU and the UN in areas such as peacekeeping or the provision of early warning for conflict prevention, the establishment of a small permanent, multinational secretariat is an important component of any future structure. Thus far SADC has not decided in favour of a permanent secretariat for the Organ — in contrast to the SADC secretariat for regional economic development located in Gaborone. In part, this delay reflects a common desire to resolve the organisational and mandate issues before tackling the subject of where such a body would be located.

Should SADC decide to establish such a secretariat, it could:

The multinational secretariat would also be well placed to run some type of a situation room to:

A more ambitious view would hold that the SADC Organ and its secretariat, in time, could come to replicate the practise at the OAU and the UN. At this level, the majority of meetings and decisions occur at ambassadorial level — although the subregion would clearly not require the same intensity and frequency of meetings. The need to consult at the levels of ministers and heads of state is thereby limited to one or more annual meetings. Since most SADC member countries have high commissioners or ambassadors in other member countries of the Community, SADC could, after designating a location for the Organ secretariat, also accredit the ambassadors or high commissioners in that country to the SADC Organ.

Such an option would also reduce the extent to which SADC and the ISDSC, with their various subcommittees, reflect layers of overlapping ministerial consultations that are expensive, time-consuming and therefore also ineffective.

Arguably the greatest deficiency within SADC, including the Organ and the ISDSC, relates to the absence of integrated systems, processes and methods to deal with the issues of human rights and the advancement of democracy and good governance. This is a contentious and sensitive issue, not only due to the fact that a country such as Swaziland is perceived to be non-democratic while others, such as Angola and the DRC are still caught up in debilitating conflict. For its part, Mozambique is in a slow transition from a devastating civil war. Elsewhere, countries such as Zambia and Zimbabwe have been accused of gerrymandering elections, while some see South Africa drifting towards one-party dominance in the absence of an effective political opposition to the African National Congress. In countries such as Malawi and Lesotho, military and paramilitary intervention in politics remains a threat.

SADC clearly has to deal with the issue of democratisation and the advancement of human rights in a sensitive manner. With the possible present exception of South Africa, SADC heads of state will not readily accept any mechanisms or institutions that threaten or potentially question their internal practices in too rigorous a manner. This being said, commitments undertaken in the realm of democracy and human rights in terms of the SADC Treaty and protocols are matters of direct and legitimate concern to all states party to the Treaty.

It is not appropriate, nor possible, to advance the cause of democracy and human rights through secretive discussions between government leaders. The nature of the instrument must match the ends. Therefore, such organisations, structures or processes must be transparent, at arm’s length from direct political control, and include and provide for interaction with civil society.

One way of meeting this requirement is to establish an Institute for Democracy and Human Rights that receives its mandate directly from the annual meeting of the SADC Heads of State and Government or the Organ. Such an institution would give recognition to four of the objectives of the Organ that were announced in the original Gaborone communiqué, but which cannot effectively be pursued by the other Organ structures, namely to:

The systematic abuse of human rights is often the best early warning that any conflict prevention mechanism could hope for. Based on the general functions of the Office for the Protection of Minorities within the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), such an institute would also partially serve as an early warning and conflict mediation mechanism. Given the traditional reluctance of intelligence agencies to share information on a multilateral basis, the existing State Security Subcommittee of the ISDSC probably serves a greater role as a confidence building process than adding additional capacity through the exchange of useful intelligence not already in the possession of member countries. As a captive of state structures, the extent to which this subcommittee provides an appropriate vehicle for an effective early warning mechanism as reflected in the aims and objectives of the Organ is questionable.

The institute, for example, could focus on the following activities:

The overarching mission of such a structure could flow directly from Article 5 of the SADC Treaty: to evolve common political values, systems and institutions in order to promote and defend peace and security.

The institute would therefore be responsible for bringing to the attention of the chairpersons of SADC and the Organ those issues that, in its informed opinion, demand mediation or preventive action.

The October 1999 recommendation by the SADC extraordinary ministerial meeting provides for the establishment of a Committee of Ministers as part of the Organ. At present, the relationship between this proposed committee and the Council of Ministers already in existence in terms of the SADC Treaty is unclear. What is important, however, is the recommendation that the committee should be chaired by the minister of Foreign Affairs of the country that is also chairing the Organ itself.

The extraordinary ministerial meeting did not provide any direction regarding the proposed functions of the Committee. Such functions could include the following:

Apart from overall responsibility for more specific objectives of the Organ which are delegated to subordinate organ structures, the committee itself would be responsible for managing the following Organ objectives:

PROPOSED FUNCTIONS OF THE MINISTERIAL COMMITTEE ON POLITICS AND DIPLOMACY

Perhaps the most important recommendation to flow from the recent discussions on the structure of the SADC Organ is the proposed establishment of a Ministerial Committee on Politics and Diplomacy that would function at the same level as the ISDSC and below the Committee of Ministers. The committee would meet for discussions on issues pertaining to peace and security, with the view of pursuing the following objectives of the Organ: