TANZANIA and Malawi expect to hold a meeting of the Joint Commission for Bilateral Cooperation early next year in a deliberate move to cement relationship between the two neighbouring nations.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and East
African Cooperation said in a statement in Dar es Salaam yesterday that
the envisaged conference will bring together experts from two sides to
deliberate on various issues of cooperation.
The gathering, according to the
statement, will also allow experts to deliberate on the challenges
facing the bilateral cooperation as well as ponder on the new areas that
the two countries seek to forge cooperation for mutual benefits.
“The experts will also come up with new
areas of cooperation and set strategies of implementing joint projects
that will be agreed upon,” said the ministry, noting that participants
attending the meeting will as well discuss joint cooperation in business
and investment, transport, energy, tourism and security.
Meanwhile, the ministry has trashed
media reports suggesting that the border dispute between Tanzania and
Malawi over Lake Nyasa were presently under the handling of
international arbitrators. A section of media had reported that
Tanzania-Malawi border dispute over the lake has recently landed at the
United Nations (UN).
The government through the statement
clarified that the dispute was at the time being handled by the panel of
retired leaders from Southern African Development Cooperation (SADC).
The panel of mediators is led by former
president of Mozambique Joachim Chisano with assistance from former
presidents of Botswana and South Africa, Mr Festus Mogae and Thabo
Mbeki, respectively.
The panel formed by the Forum for Former
African Heads of State and Government was tasked to examine various
evidences that Tanzania and Malawi had submitted over the disputed
Africa’s third biggest lake.
The ministry noted further in its
statement that the panel had already met the two sides in Mozambique for
preliminary consultation, adding that despite the pending dispute,
diplomatic relationship between Tanzania and Malawi remain intact.
“Diplomatic relations between the two
nations have been getting deeper day by day in all spheres of life
-economic, political and social,” the ministry said, advising the media
houses, public and other stakeholders to seek information from reliable
sources instead of disseminating false, malicious and halfcooked news
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