By Moses Magadza

WINDHOEK, Namibia – Sweden has described the SADC Parliamentary Forum as a trusted regional partner and an effective channel for advancing sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) and has praised its work to equip parliamentarians to hold governments accountable.

Speaking after a courtesy call on SADC PF Secretary General Her Excellency Boemo Sekgoma in Namibia last week, Mr Johan Frisell, Director for Africa and Deputy Director-General, Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Sweden, said the Forum had been “a great partner to Sweden for many years.”

During the courtesy call, Mr Frisell and H.E. Sekgoma discussed the value of Sweden’s funding and the operating context of the SADC PF. Sweden is supporting the Forum’s SRHR, HIV and AIDS Governance Project.

Mr Frisell said parliamentary engagement helps build regional ownership of shared goals and strengthens results. Parliaments, he noted, have two fundamental responsibilities: passing laws and approving annual budgets. Through these roles, they can establish the legal basis for rights and fund the services needed to uphold them.

“Parliaments are indispensable in the provision of both services and upholding the rights,” he said. He added that Southern African parliaments have a particularly “forward-leaning role” in Africa, working alongside executives and courts to protect rights and services.

Asked about the organised anti-rights push, Mr Frisell urged parliaments to defend gains already secured in national laws. He said these achievements had been enshrined by African parliaments over the past two or three decades, and that each country must consider how to respond to what he described as new pressures from outside.

“We believe that the rights agenda is indigenous to the African countries,” he said. “We have high hopes that parliaments and governments will resist these influences.”

Mr Frisell also warned that dwindling overseas development funding for health was placing added pressure on governments. Parliaments and governments, he said, would need to decide how to mobilise domestic resources to fill gaps where donor funding had previously supported services.

“That is the ultimate proof of whether there is national ownership over the health agenda, including sexual and reproductive health and rights,” he said. He acknowledged that financing services and protecting rights would be “a tall order,” but described it as an important step towards countries taking full responsibility for the agenda.

Mr Frisell primarily praised SADC PF’s contribution to SRHR and highlighted its progressive legislation in support of human rights and its working group, which brings parliamentarians together and provides tools to hold governments accountable for their commitments.

“That is exactly what parliaments are there for,” he said. Parliamentary cooperation, he added, can “inspire, train and prepare parliaments to perform the functions that they are meant to do.”

-Moses Magadza is the Media and Communications Manager at the SADC Parliamentary Forum.