By Siding with Polisario South Africa at Odds with Majority of African Countries, South African Paper

6/18/2018

Mail & Guardian, South Africa's widely circulated daily, criticized South Africa's position on the Sahara issue on Tuesday, pointing out that by joining Polisario separatists, Pretoria is contradicting itself with the majority of African countries.

South Africa's political support for the so-called Rasd (self-proclaimed ghostly entity by Polisario separatists) puts Pretoria at odds with more than half of members of the African Union (AU), the paper says in an analysis of the role that Pretoria is called upon to play after its recent election as non-permanent member of the UN Security Council.

According to the newspaper, the Sahara will have to determine relations between the African countries members of the UN Security Council. The three African countries that are members of the UN body: Ivory Coast, Equatorial Guinea and South Africa, will have to form an interesting group to follow, explains Liesl Louw-Vaudran, an analyst of the Institute of security studies (ISS, based in Pretoria).

The analyst who oversees the preparation of the report on the AU Peace and Security Council on behalf of ISS, stresses that relations between these three countries in the Security Council will be determined according to the position from each country concerning the regional conflict of the Sahara.

Turning to the role of South Africa at the Security Council, Louw-Vaudran said that this role will depend on the capacity of this country to show flexibility.

-News on Western Sahara issue/ Corcas-