Seychelles’ Permanent Representative of the Republic of Seychelles to the African Union, Ambassador Conrad Mederic, represented the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Tourism, Mr. Sylvestre Radegonde, at the 43rd Ordinary Session of the African Union Executive Council.

The session was held from 13th to 14th July 2023 at the United Nations Complex in Nairobi under the 2023 African Union theme: “Accelerating of the AfCFTA Implementation”.

In his intervention during the session, Ambassador Mederic explained that as a Small Island Developing State highly dependent on imports, Seychelles, despite being classified as a “High Income Country”, remains vulnerable to external shocks and finds it extremely challenging to access international development aid, including loans at concessional rates to fund its development and adaptation efforts. Ambassador Mederic thus supported the recommendation for the current scale of assessment (2020-2023) to be maintained from 2024 to 2026. In turn, this will ensure that Seychelles’ yearly contributions to the African Union Commission will remain unaffected.

The annual July Executive Council Sessions focused its discussion on the budget of the African Union Commission for the consecutive year. Other key matters addressed at this Session were the Scale of Assessment which determines the yearly contributions of Member States to the Commission, Audit Reports of the African Union Commission, and a briefing on the African Union Institutional Reform and the Agenda 2063.

This year, the Union of Comoros presides over the African Union and the Chairperson of the Executive Council is H.E. Mr. Dhoihir Dhoulkamal, Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation in charge of Diaspora and Francophonie of the Union of Comoros.

The Executive Council was followed by the 5th Mid-Year-Coordination Meeting on 16th July 2023 for Members of the Bureau of the African Union at the Heads of State Level, Regional Economic Communities, and Regional Mechanisms.