President Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa today co-chaired the joint Southern African Development Community SADC), East African Community extraordinary Summit.

Mnangagwa co-chaired the joint virtual Summit with Kenyan President William Ruto.

Mnangagwa is the outgoing SADC chairperson while his Kenyan counterpart Ruto chairs the EAC.

“As Co-chair of the SADC/EAC Extraordinary Summit on the DRC peace process, I called for unity, dialogue, and action on the root causes of unrest.

“This joint initiative demonstrates African solutions to African problems,” said President Mnangagwa.

EAC is an intergovernmental organisation in East Africa.

The EAC’s membership consists of eight states: Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Federal Republic of Somalia, the Republics of Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, South Sudan, Uganda, and Tanzania.

The organisation was founded in 1967, collapsed in 1977, and was revived on 7 July 2000. The main objective of the EAC is to foster regional economic integration.

SADC is a Regional Economic Community comprising 16 Member States; Angola, Botswana, Comoros, Democratic Republic of Congo, Eswatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Meanwhile in other news, cabinet has approved the National Youth Empowerment Strategy: 2026 to 2030.

The strategy aims to create an enabling environment for promoting youth
participation in the mainstream formal economy.

Through the Strategy, Ministries, Departments and Agencies; Local Authorities; the Private Sector; and Development Partners will be required to initiate deliberate programmes and projects that economically empower youths through job creation.

The strategy will also serve as an implementation tool for the National Development Strategy 2 through mainstreaming of youth issues in the national development Agenda.

Cabinet also approved the Hosting of the African Women Leaders Network 7th Inter-Generational Retreat from 5-7 September 2025 at the Rainbow Towers in Harare.

The African Women Leaders Retreat is a flagship initiative jointly established by the African Union (AU) and the United Nations (UN) wholly dedicated to enhancing women’s Participation in leadership, in line with the African Union’s Agenda 2063 and the United Nations’ Agenda 2030.