REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT DINNER HOSTED BY THE RIGHT HONOURABLE PRIME MINISTER OF LESOTHO
REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT DINNER HOSTED BY THE RIGHT HONOURABLE PRIME MINISTER OF LESOTHO MONDAY, 12TH JUNE, 2006
May I commence by paying my respects to:
His Majesty King Letsie III
The Right Honourable, the Prime Minister and the First Lady, ‘M’e Mathato Honourable President of the Senate
Honourable Speaker of the National Assembly
His Lordship the Chief Justice
Honourable Deputy Prime Minister
Honourable Ministers
Honourable Judges of the Court of Appeal
Honourable Judges of the High Court
Honourable Members of the Council of State
Your Excellencies Heads of Diplomatic Missions and International Organizations
Distinguished Guests
Bo-‘M’e le Bo-Ntate (Ladies and Gentlemen).
On my own behalf and that of my husband, the visiting Irish delegation and the Irish Community here in Lesotho, allow me to express our sincere gratitude for the friendly manner in which we have been welcomed to this beautiful country, which it is such a privilege to visit.
Ireland’s strong connection to Lesotho predates by more than a hundred years Irish Aid’s presence here or indeed Lesotho’s recent twinning with County Kerry. In the nineteenth century, Irish born Joseph Orpen, in his capacity as mediator representing the British Administration in South Africa, became a close confidant and trusted friend of King Moshoeshoe I. In our own time, an Irish priest, Fr. Dermot Tuohy, was deeply involved with the early days of what is today the National University of Lesotho and in the early 1990s, an Irishman, Peter Brendan Cullinan, served as your Chief Justice. Happily, Justice Cullinan is still with us today, living in retirement in South Africa.
The missionary connection, both Anglican and Catholic, between Ireland and Lesotho is extensive and long-standing. In 1911, Irish born Francis Richard Balfour was made Anglican Assistant Bishop of Bloemfontein, with special responsibility for Lesotho. An Obelisk stands in his honour close to the Basotho Hat in the centre of Maseru. The Salesian Order celebrated its 25th Anniversary in St. Luke’s Parish in Maputsoe last year. Numerous Irish priests and nuns have been associated with St. Luke’s in that time. Here in Maseru, Fr. Denis O’Callaghan, an Oblate Father, has given over forty years’ service to the Basotho people. Through the lives of these unselfish men and women Ireland and Lesotho have been made known to one another and involved with one another.
At the political level, the close relationship between our two countries has been demonstrated by many visits of Ministers of your Government to Ireland and of Irish Ministers to Lesotho. Our Taoiseach, Mr. Bertie Ahern visited Lesotho in 2000, and you yourself, Prime Minister, reciprocated by visiting Ireland last year. This year, two major milestones have been reached in our relationship. In April, the Irish Government decided to upgrade the Consulate here in Maseru to Embassy status and the Consul General to Ambassador. This demonstrated and underpinned our commitment to Lesotho. The second milestone is my own visit here, the first by an Irish Head of State. I am deeply conscious of the sense of occasion this entails.
Your Government, too, Prime Minister, has underlined its ties with Ireland. Last year your first resident Ambassador to Ireland, Mrs. ‘Mannete Ramaili, presented her credentials to me.
Part of the explanation for the close ties between our two countries is the fact that we have much in common, which makes it easy for us to identify with Lesotho. For many years after independence, Ireland, a small country, was very dependent on its nearest neighbour, a much larger country, the United Kingdom, for trade. Our currency was matched one-for-one with our neighbour’s. With high unemployment rates, every year many of our people emigrated to the UK, and further afield and we witnessed the loss of our greatest natural asset – the talent and brain-power of our people as they left our shores in search of opportunity elsewhere. These are all issues with which Lesotho is very familiar. You, too, are a small country, completely surrounded by a single big neighbour, South Africa, on whom you are very dependent. Your currency is pegged to that of South Africa and emigration to South Africa is commonplace.
That situation has changed now for Ireland. We expanded our exports markets and are now less dependent on our neighbour. However, we have benefited greatly, and continue to benefit, from good economic and political cooperation with the UK. Lesotho, likewise, will always have a special relationship with its neighbour.
Irish Aid has been working here in Lesotho for just over thirty years providing substantial technical and financial assistance to various projects and sectors that have aided development. Our aid programme is driven by moral considerations, rather than any political or economic reasons. We see the suffering of Lesotho’s poor as our brothers and sisters. We see our outreach as an expression of shared humanity and real solidarity. We believe that we are all diminished when poverty and lack of opportunity waste the talents and ambitions of generations in any part of the world. And so we hope to help Lesotho’s people and Government as they work to overcome poverty and realise their nation’s fullest potential.
The current Irish Aid programme, which covers the period 2005 to 2007, has as its overall goal to support the Government and people of Lesotho to reduce poverty in line with Vision 2020, the Poverty Reduction strategy and the UN Millennium Development Goals. The programme identifies two strategic objectives to meet this goal. The first is to strengthen the core systems of the Government to promote efficiency, accountability, transparency, gender equality and citizen participation. The second is to improve the quality of service delivery in education, health, HIV/AIDS and water and sanitation, in line with the Poverty Reduction Strategy. Funding of just under 28 million euro is being provided over the three years.
Donor coordination and harmonization is a major challenge and a major necessity facing donors today. Irish Aid is committed to working in partnership with all the other donors, multilateral and bilateral, currently operating in Lesotho so as to improve both the efficiency and effectiveness of aid delivered.
The biggest struggle facing Lesotho today is, undoubtedly, the scourge of the HIV/AIDS pandemic. According to the recent Demographic Health Survey, the adult prevalence rate for HIV/AIDS is 23.4%, one of the highest in the world. Tragically the rate is even higher among young adults and you face the appalling waste of seventy HIV/AIDS related deaths every day here - that is 25,000 deaths per year.
The pandemic has impacted on every sector. One of the particularly cruel consequences is that there are over 100,000 orphans, with over 200,000 children having lost at least one parent. The pulverising effect on civic society is relentless and horrifying but the tide of damage is stoppable and Irish Aid is working with the Minister of Health and Social Welfare and the other Development Partners to turn that tide as quickly as possible.
Ireland is proud to be able to support Lesotho’s quest for a better future and I pay a warm tribute to those Irish men and women who have worked so hard in Lesotho for the Basotho people over the years. In particular, I remember with pride those who spent their lives here, who died here or returned home when seriously ill, to die. On this occasion I remember too the small number of fellow-Irishmen who were the tragic victims of senseless crime. Their untimely deaths shocked us but in no way diminished Ireland’s regard for the Basotho people or Ireland’s commitment to their well-being.
Prime Minister, I pay tribute to the close and harmonious working relationship Irish Aid enjoys with your Government and through you, may I acknowledge the lovely welcome, generosity and graciousness accorded by the Basotho people to all the Irish people who have served here.
Kea leboha. Thank you.