THOUGHTS FROM DELEGATES ATTENDING THE CONFERENCE

What Is Your Take On The Conference Thus Far?
Thus far I think the initiative is good, I am just a little bit worried about what the overall take away will be. It is nice to meet in hotels but that doesn’t change the debt issue, it doesn’t change the fact that Africa is increasing in debt daily. I’m just hoping from these discussions it goes further than just the hotel and straight to people’s homes, their communities and anywhere so long as it is deeper in the continent and spreads as awareness to the people. – Temashengu Tshabalala

Name one or two strategic issues you picked up during the conference?
What I’ve picked up is the fact that as Africa we are not yet in a conundrum because the natural resources we have their values are more than the debt we currently have and we can simply pay off our debt and with some of the remaining can be used for the development of the countries. I’ve also learned that we should move away from focusing much on debt management and move towards debt governance for us to be able to not fall into the debt conundrum.- Liberty Matsive

What would you like to see OSISA do more moving forward with regards to the debt conundrum?
I think there is a need to continue with this process though I am not sure what the way forward would be. But I think the support that has been given to different groups to have a better understanding of the debt issues in their countries should be in a more rigorous way understanding where the debt is coming from, what the amounts are and how it has been contracted. Some of it is new debt some of it is old debt and who are the players. Use debt as one perspective of raising questions about human, social and economic development in SADC and in Africa. – Nancy Kachingwe

What would you like to see OSISA do more moving forward with regards to the debt conundrum?
Moving forward OSISA needs to work more with SADC, ECOWAS, and other big organisations and engage more in those platforms as most African countries are members there. – Nelisiwe Nhlabatsi

Name one or two strategic issues you picked up during the conference?
Civil society organisation must be in coalition as we find out in such settings that we have similar issues and are more or less affected by them. – Luis Nhachote