Guinea-Bissau, 2009

My first words are to congratulate Mr. Ali Abdussalam

Treki on his election to the presidency of the General

Assembly at its sixty-fourth session. Aware of his skill

and his vast diplomatic experience, we are convinced

that this session will be crowned with success. My

country, Guinea-Bissau, which has excellent relations

of friendship and cooperation with his country, Libya,

welcomes his election and assures him of our fraternal

cooperation during his term.

I wish to congratulate and express the

appreciation of Guinea-Bissau to Father Miguel

d’Escoto Brockmann for his performance and his

dedication to the successful conduct of the work of the

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sixty-third session. I should also like to thank the

Secretary-General, His Excellency Mr. Ban Ki-moon,

for his comprehensive report on the work of our

Organization and the excellent work he has done to

ensure the consolidation of peace and development

throughout the world. In particular, I should like to

congratulate Mr. Treki for holding the high-level

gathering on climate change on 22 September as a

prelude to the Copenhagen conference to be held in

December.

Six months after the crisis caused by the

assassination of our President, we have restored

constitutional normality, and the organs of State power

are in a position to fulfil the role entrusted to them by

our Constitution. We have just inaugurated a new

President, His Excellency Mr. Malam Bacai Sanhá,

who was democratically elected in elections deemed

free, fair and transparent by all political parties and

candidates and by international observers.

The party that I have the honour to chair, the

African Party for the Independence of Guinea-Bissau

and Cape Verde, has a qualified majority in parliament

and in an inclusive Government, and now the President

of the Republic is from among its ranks. Never in its

history has our country enjoyed such great conditions

for stability. We have thus created the conditions for

implementing the reforms that the country so

pressingly needs, in particular, reform of the public

administration, with particular emphasis on the defence

and security sectors, as well as public finance reform

and the decentralization and modernization of the State

apparatus.

In this regard, I would like to highlight the role

and contribution of subregional organizations, such as

the Economic Community of West African States

(ECOWAS), the West African Economic and Monetary

Union and the Community of Portuguese-speaking

Countries (CPLP), as well as of the African Union and

the United Nations, whose constant support has

allowed our Government to make substantive progress

in the normalization of the country’s political,

economic and social life and development. I should

like further to highlight the substantial support

provided by the European Union during the difficult

period we have gone through. In addition, I should like

to thank the brothers of the CPLP countries for their

continued commitment and solidarity.

The latest crisis situation in Guinea-Bissau

resulted in the assassinations of the head of State and

the Chief of Staff of the Guinean Armed Forces. Those

tragic events surprised and shocked all of Guinean

society and the international community. They revealed

the vulnerabilities of our rule of law and the

weaknesses of the national defence and security

system.

In addition to strongly condemning those crimes,

the Government immediately ordered the establishment

of a committee to enable us to find out the truth and

hold the perpetrators accountable. Since then, owing to

its concerns about the objectivity, transparency and

speed of the process, our Government made a request

to the Secretary-General that an international inquiry

be carried out under the auspices of the United

Nations. In response to that request and on the basis of

Security Council resolutions, the Secretary-General

urged the Government to continue its own investigation

of those crimes, offering, however, to intervene with

the African Union, ECOWAS and the CPLP to provide

the technical, financial and other types of support that

might be necessary. Following that response from the

Secretary-General, the Government sent requests for

support to those organizations but has not yet received

a response. The Government is truly looking forward to

any assistance that can be offered by the African

Union, ECOWAS and the CPLP.

We want to take advantage of our presence in

New York to engage with all those organizations to

ensure that conditions that would give a new dynamic

to the work of the Committee of Inquiry are

established, and we consider the attainment of that

objective an essential condition in order to ensure

genuine justice and contribute to the consolidation of

the democratic rule of law and the protection and

promotion of human rights. We seize this opportunity,

from this rostrum, to firmly and unequivocally reaffirm

that we are against impunity. We will not be a party to

it, nor give safe haven to any type of crime. So I can

assure you that the Government of Guinea-Bissau will

do everything in its power to create the conditions for

the Committee to carry out its work in a peaceful,

transparent and credible manner.

Those events caused a serious crisis in my

country, which led to a radical change in the priorities

of Government policy — specifically, it became

necessary to hold presidential elections. However,

despite the gravity of the situation, the response of our

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institutions was swift and positive. The President of the

People’s National Assembly temporarily assumed the

presidency of the Republic, as provided for in the

Constitution, and a date was immediately set for the

holding of early presidential elections, according to the

covenant of understanding among the political parties.

The tenure of the interim president, which has

recently ended, was marked by the promotion of a

constructive and frank dialogue between civil society

and political society, with a particular focus on

clarifying the objectives of the defence and security

sector reform, which is a crucial pillar for peace and

stability in the country.

In Guinea-Bissau, the creation of the armed

forces preceded the creation of the State itself, and the

latter inherited a burden of complex problems in the

aftermath of the armed struggle for national liberation.

As in other countries with a similar past, the problems

associated with this condition are not easy to

overcome, especially when facing survival issues that

plague all of society. Aware of these facts, the

Government held a round table discussion in Praia,

Cape Verde, last May to jointly evaluate the proposed

reform programme for the defence and security sectors

with the help of our development partners, the United

Nations, ECOWAS and the CPLP. The continuation of

the reform programme in the military and security

forces, within which the establishment of a Special

Pensions Fund is planned, specially designed to deal

with these issues, can contribute to solving those

problems once and for all.

My Government has just concluded a thorough

assessment of our national poverty reduction strategy.

The results of this evaluation allowed us to conclude

that we must strengthen our action on all the axes that

define the strategy. It also enabled us, after careful

consideration, to determine that the greatest

impediment to the development of our country lies in

the energy sector. It was concluded that the top priority

should be to develop an energy plan that solves this

problem definitively. We would therefore like to use

this forum to ask our development partners to carry out

the interim review of our poverty reduction strategy

and its respective programmes as soon as possible so

that we can organize, together with our partners, a

round table to address the need to strengthen the

technical, economic and financial cooperation

programmes with our country. This round table, which

we would like to organize under the title of

“Reconciliation and Development”, will take into

account the new strategic direction advocated by the

Security Council, with the transformation of the

current United Nations presence in Guinea-Bissau into

an integrated mission from January 2010.

I believe I am in a position to say that, by

working selflessly within this framework and with the

resources that we obtain, we will be better able to

accomplish the Millennium Development Goals set by

the United Nations, in particular with regard to the

consolidation of peace and stability in our country.

We welcome with satisfaction and encourage the

policy of President Obama towards Africa, as recently

clarified during his visit to some African countries; it

shows concern for the stability of our subregion and of

the world at large, and devotes greater attention to the

promotion of development. We also welcome with

satisfaction the peace initiatives that are under way in

the Middle East under his patronage, as well as the

United States Administration’s policy towards Cuba;

we hope that the embargo against Cuba will be lifted in

the near future.

We have been asking our development partners

for many years for a post-conflict programme for

Guinea-Bissau. A country with such severe shortages

as ours should not be abandoned to its fate, given the

profound consequences of the political-military

conflict of 1998-1999, which continue to affect all

socio-economic sectors of Guinea-Bissau. Guinea-

Bissau, which once possessed foreign currency

reserves enough to provide for six months’ worth of

imports and which paid regular wages to its State

employees, can no longer honour its commitments

because of the war.

I am therefore particularly pleased with the

position of the African Development Bank, which,

understanding the needs of a post-conflict country,

turned an important part of the financial resources

available to Guinea-Bissau into donations. Likewise,

we welcome the recent decision by the International

Monetary Fund and the World Bank to negotiate and

conclude a post-conflict programme with our

Government, which will soon be joining the Poverty

Reduction and Growth Facility, which will enhance

cooperation with our key development partners. We

hope this new and dynamic level of cooperation will

enable us to benefit from the initiative for debt relief

under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative.

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I should like publicly to express our appreciation

to the heads of State of the West African Economic and

Monetary Union, Angola, Nigeria, the Leader and

Guide of the Great Socialist Libyan Arab Jamahiriya,

as well as to the CPLP and the European Union, for

their support in covering our budget deficit, which has

greatly contributed to the climate of peace in which we

now live. Moreover, we acknowledge the presence of

South Africa, Brazil and India, which have been

contributing significantly to mitigating food shortages

in our country through the India, Brazil and South

Africa programme.

I should like to assure the General Assembly that,

in bearing our responsibility for the governance of

Guinea-Bissau, we shall strive to continue to merit the

trust and support that the international community has

granted us. We will do everything possible to enable

Guinea-Bissau to make strides towards development

and the well-being of its people.

We are of the opinion that the people of Guinea-

Bissau themselves should seek to resolve their internal

problems, especially those arising from social, political

and military issues. However, one has to recognize that

the reasons for the recurrence of the cyclical issues in

our country are not only domestic in nature. Factors

such as transnational organized crime and drug

trafficking, in particular, have contributed to

exacerbating the situation in Guinea-Bissau.

By taking advantage of our shortcomings in sea

and land border control and in our administration

structures, which are weak in some regions, and by

using sophisticated means, certain groups have

introduced drugs into our country with the support

received from influential people in the State apparatus.

My Government is committed to participating in

all programmes and initiatives adopted in the subregion

of West Africa to combat drug trafficking and

organized crime, as we are convinced of the need to

establish mechanisms for coordination and support to

fight these scourges.

We are prepared to examine the possibility of the

participation of foreign forces in our country in joint

surveillance missions monitoring our land and

maritime borders as well as our airspace, in order to

eradicate organized crime and all forms of trafficking

in drugs, weapons and people, from or through the

territory of Guinea-Bissau.

I would like to state before this Assembly my

commitment as Prime Minister and president of the

historic party founded by Amilcar Cabral, the African

Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde,

to strive to put Guinea-Bissau on the path of peace,

national reconciliation and development. We will

respect all the commitments made by my Government,

whether related to peacebuilding, policy dialogue,

poverty reduction and the creation of conditions

conducive to economic growth and well-being of the

Guinean people.

I ask the international community and our

development partners who believe in our determination

to end the cycles of crises and the recurring conflicts in

Guinea-Bissau to provide a new opportunity to our

country for a true partnership in favour of sustainable

development.

I want to thank all the friends and partners of

Guinea-Bissau for their solidarity and support. I can

assure the Assembly that we will spare no efforts and

will not be deterred by any obstacles in consolidating

peace and political stability, promoting national unity

in Guinea-Bissau and creating better living conditions

for the Guinean people.

I leave this podium with a very special expression

of our gratitude to all those who have contributed to

this normalization, with particular attention, if you will

allow me, to all of the members of the Contact Group,

the Ad Hoc Advisory Group on Guinea-Bissau, whose

mandate was recently terminated, all members of the

Security Council, as well as to the Secretary-General

and his Representative in Guinea-Bissau.

However, the most sublime show of appreciation

on our part would be to build a peaceful and

prosperous Guinea-Bissau for all its children, which

we will strive to do with all our might.