Africa-Press – Mauritius. The Secretary-General (SG) of the Commonwealth, Rt Hon Patricia Scotland KC, accompanied by a delegation, paid a courtesy call on the Prime Minister, Mr Pravind Kumar Jugnauth, this afternoon, in Port-Louis.
In a statement after the meeting, SG Scotland highlighted that she was very pleased and proud to have this opportunity to speak to the Prime Minister and commend the stoic commitment Mauritius has shown concerning all the issues that the Commonwealth is now dealing with.
“Mauritius,” she stated, “is a Small Island Developing State and even then, has achieved so much, such as its inclusion in the Mo Ibrahim Good Governance Index.
Furthermore, Rt Hon Patricia Scotland KC indicated that Mauritius, like all of the Commonwealth members, has gone through a very traumatic time in the last three to four years.
“We have been faced with so many challenges such as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, the economic tsunami that have come as a result of the lockdown, and now, with food insecurity which has arisen as a result of the war between Russia and Ukraine and through all that, resilience has been necessary,” she said.
On this score, she expressed satisfaction to see that the Mauritian economy has bounced back and is now at a 4.6 Gross Domestic Product growth, and is now talking about the trade between Commonwealth countries.
“The fact that we now have more than 721 billion US dollars of inter-commonwealth trade, our hope is that this trade will increase to one trillion US dollars by 2026 and to two trillion US dollars by 2030,” the SG stressed.
The Commonwealth’s SG further added that discussions with the Prime Minister focused on the energy transition from fossil fuels to green energy and the role that this country has played to support the rest of the Commonwealth in raising finance to six million US dollars for climate change as the host of the Commonwealth Climate Finance Access Hub.
“We have already distributed 310 million US dollars to our Member States that is, to the 33 small states in our Commonwealth out of which 25 are Island States,” she said.
Rt Hon Patricia Scotland KC indicated that she also thanked the Prime Minister for the contribution that the Mauritian Government and people have done to the Commonwealth’s Blue Charter, inviting commitment to our living lands charter which is going to bring the three real Conventions on climate change into absolute positive action but also celebrating what Mauritius is doing.
“We are proposing two new strategies, one which is called a Compass, which is looking at how we can come together and make more sustainable policies and approaches to deliver better tourism and secondly, looking at something which is going to hopefully help us to bring more inward investment into all of our countries and the fact that together we are making a huge contribution,” she stated.
In addition, the SG highlighted that it was a great privilege to be able to come and say thank you to the people of Mauritius, and to all the Ministers who are going to be participating and have participated in all that the commonwealth is doing.
“I also feel extremely blessed to have participated in the celebrations of the 15th Anniversary of the inclusion of Le Morne Cultural Landscape on the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s World Heritage List and to be able to stand at the foot of that mountain and remember all the pain and contribution that was made by our forefathers who have made it possible for all of us to have the life we now have,” she concluded.
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