Hon Chairperson, executives present, comrades and guests, in explicating our general principle established by the 1955 Congress of the People that two of our pillars of the new South Africa must be peace and friendship, the Morogoro Consultative Conference of 1969 pronounced that: Democratic South Africa shall take its place as a member of the OAU - the current AU - and work to strengthen Pan-African unity in all fields. Our country will actively support national liberation movements of the people of the world against imperialism, colonialism and neocolonialism. Diplomatic relations will be established with all countries regardless of their social and political systems on the principles of mutual respect for each other's independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity.
South Africa's strategic orientation regarding foreign relations is driven by the collective vision of all South Africans to live in a peaceful and friendly world. The ANC regards peaceful coexistence as a sine qua non for all human development. Its view is, and always has been, that peace and development are mutually reinforcing.
After being an international pariah for decades due to its relentless persecution of the doctrine of separate development, South Africa was welcomed into the sisterhood of nations in 1994. South Africa has been able to put behind it its divisive past and is united in building a new nonracial, nonsexist and prosperous society. We are one of the few countries with a Constitution that is not only the supreme law of the country, but also entrenches the Bill of Rights. Our democracy is truly based on the will of the people and takes both the participatory and the representative form.
The founding provisions of our Constitution are stated in its first section as the following:
The Republic of South Africa is one, sovereign, democratic state founded on the following values: human dignity, the achievement of equality and the advancement of human rights and freedom; nonracialism and nonsexism; supremacy of the constitution and the rule of law; universal adult suffrage and a national voters roll; regular elections and a multiparty system of democratic government to ensure accountability, responsiveness and openness.
Our forbears mentioned as grounds for validating our chosen path being part of the family of nations. We have chosen a path of peaceful coexistence that is underpinned by constitutionalism and without derogating from the rights of people to follow a path of our own choice, for experience persuaded us to commend the same to other nations with analogous objectives and also subjective conditions. The ANC has, from its launch in 1912, been oriented towards progressive internationalism. It has been its view that injustice and violation of human rights is a phenomenon of universal proportion. Progressive international forces should unite to fight against such undesirables.
In this regard, the ANC mobilised the international community to isolate the apartheid government, and in the same vein it persuaded the United Nations to declare apartheid as a crime against humanity. It boasts two of its former presidents, Chief Albert Mvumbi Luthuli and Dr Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, being recognised for their peace-building conduct through the prestigious Nobel Peace Prize.
The tradition of peaceful engagement had seen South Africans negotiate peacefully and agreeing to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to deal with the past atrocities. Through full disclosure and evidence of political motive, perpetrators of gross human rights violations were granted amnesty. It should be noted that we used our ubuntu values to eschew retribution for restorative justice.
In principle, we support the efforts of oppressed people to liberate themselves. However, we are opposed to all acts of terrorism. Terrorism in our view targets innocent civilians and is not focused on achieving justice. We, however, are averse to aggressive methods to deal with perceptions of terrorism; we believe that sovereign states should be engaged constructively, without a semblance of interference, and that citizens of countries should be empowered to solve their own problems. Where military intervention is inevitable for a fair, reasonable and just resolution, we are convinced that there should be a comprehensive post- conflict reconstruction and development.
The tendency to leave this to a plethora of development agencies working in silos should be replaced by a co-ordinated intervention designed to strengthen the transition to full and permanent peace by creating conducive political and economic conditions. The threat of reversal in many cases also comes from failure to transform economies, failure to expand economic opportunities to combatants, failure to undertake coherent capacity- building programmes and failure to help build post-conflict states that are capable of delivering essential services to their citizens.
Coming to my conclusion, our commitment to peaceful coexistence among nations has demonstrated itself in our activities within the Southern African Development Community, SADC, and the African Union, AU. We will continue to engage in efforts to consolidate the SADC as a regional economic community as a first step towards the development of the South African union government. We take a developmental approach in our engagements in the SADC forum to ensure diversification of the economies of member states.
It is our considered view that most multilateral institutions do not serve the interests of the poor. The UN is often obstructed and limited in its capacity to resolve international conflicts because of the lack of political will on the part of its members, particularly the permanent members of the Security Council. The Bretton Woods institutions perpetuate dominance of the world economy by the rich countries. The UN Security Council's composition and veto system benefit the interests of the permanent member states.
We stand convinced that the foregoing status quo ante requires that the mandate of, inter alia, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, IMF, should be redefined to focus on fighting poverty and assist in building the economies of developing countries. The World Bank, IMF and World Trade Organisation, WTO, should be more accountable, transparent and responsible.
It is our view that global inequality, evinced by the unequal distribution of power in the UN Security Council and international economic organisations, is a problem for our foreign policy. It breeds global poverty, conflict and terrorism. We believe that multilateralism allows for a democratic expression of the collective will of the community of nations, regardless of the size of their economies, armies and territory.
South Africa does not see values and interests as mutually exclusive, but as mutually reinforcing. Consequently, in pursuing foreign policy, South Africa does not sacrifice its values. It seeks substantive realisation of a better life for South Africa, as well as a better life for Africans and citizens of the world. We choose our allies and friends based on the foregoing principle. South Africa's world view is oriented by the struggle against inequality, injustice, oppression and crimes against humanity. As such, we envisage a new world order based on the principles of equality, justice, freedom, peace, democracy and human rights. Thank you.