First Zimbabwean ambassador to Seychelles accredited |27 October 2021

Mr Hamadziripi presenting his credentials to President Ramkalawan (Photo: Jude Morel)

The first Zimbabwean ambassador to Seychelles, David Douglas Hamadziripi, presented his credentials to President Wavel Ramkalawan at State House yesterday morning.

Although Zimbabwe and Seychelles have a long-standing diplomatic relationship dating back to March 11, 1987, it is the first time Zimbabwe delegates an ambassador to the Seychelles.

Following his courtesy call to President Ramkalawan, Ambassador Hamadziripi also called on Vice-President Ahmed Afif at State House.

“I had a very good meeting with the president. We discussed the general state of relations between Zimbabwe and the Seychelles which we both characterised as excellent. We do have very good relations and discussed ways we can improve on these relations in a practical way – areas of cooperation for instance in tourism,” stated the ambassador.

“We believe that this is an area where we can benefit from the experiences of Seychelles. Zimbabwe is also a very attractive tourism destination, we offer a different package altogether but we can benefit from your experience in marketing, training and other related areas in the tourism sector.”

Mr Hamadziripi highlighted the various similarities between the two countries including that both Seychelles and Zimbabwe are members of the African Union (AU), Southern African Development Community (SADC) and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa).

President Ramkalawan also briefed the new ambassador on Seychelles’ experience in combating the Covid-19 pandemic and Mr Hamadziripi noted that he is impressed with the percentage of people already vaccinated in Seychelles.

“We have a vaccination programme in Zimbabwe as well that is progressing well but the numbers of those that have been vaccinated are not as high as that of Seychelles,” he added.

In regards to his meeting with Vice-President Afif, Mr Hamadziripi said they spoke of the forthcoming conference on climate change that will be held in Glasgow between October 31 and November 12 which the presidents of Seychelles and Zimbabwe are attending.

“We hope that my president and His Excellency, the President of the Republic of Seychelles will be able to have some discussions there as well. The vice-president and I discussed about the accelerating of climate change and it is our expectation that developed countries, which are largely responsible for this acceleration in climate change, will meet their commitments in terms of financial and technical support to developing countries so that we can better mitigate the effects of climate change.”

During his stay in the country, Mr Hamadziripi called on various ministries, government officials and other organisations, including the Speaker of the National Assembly, Ministry of Agriculture, Environment and Climate Change, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Tourism and the chairman of the Seychelles Chamber of Commerce and Industries (SCCI), with the view of exploring areas of trade, investment and development as well as to improve people to people relations between Zimbabwe and Seychelles.

Mr Hamadziripi who arrived in the country on Sunday will leave Seychelles tomorrow. He will be based in Pretoria, South Africa.

Elsie Pointe