ZIMBABWE’S FIRST LADY BOWS OUT OF THE PAN AFRICAN PARLIAMENT

Zimbabwe’s First Lady, Auxillia Mnangagwa, has relinquished her membership of the Pan African Parliament (PAP) to concentrate on her role as the wife of the President. She was until her resignation, the chairperson of the Southern African Regional Caucus of the Pan-African Parliament (PAP).  She had been chairperson of the Caucus since 2015.

The First Lady bade farewell to her counterparts during the Sixth Ordinary Session of the Fourth Parliament of the Pan African Parliament in South Africa on Monday  May 7, 2018 and said she was going to concentrate on improving livelihoods of Zimbabweans.

“Dear colleagues, I stand before you with a heavy heart to pronounce my imminent departure from this esteemed legislative body of our motherland, Africa, the PAP,” she said.

She had earlier given up her parliamentary seat at the Zimbabwe’s National Parliament in February 2018 to concentrate on her new role.

Since becoming the First Lady, Mnangagwa has been spearheading various initiatives to help the disadvantaged and has since set up a charity organization to fight cervical cancer.

Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa took over from former President Robert Mugabe in November 2017, following a military intervention.

PAP was established in March 2004, by Article 17 of The Constitutive Act of the African Union, as one of the nine Organs provided for in the Treaty Establishing the African Economic Community signed in Abuja , Nigeria , in 1991.

The establishment of the Pan-African Parliament is informed by a vision to provide a common platform for African peoples and their grass-roots organizations to be more involved in discussions and decision-making on the problems and challenges facing the continent.

The seat of the parliament is in Midrand, South Africa.