REMARKS BY PREMIER
Your Excellency
Ladies and Gentlemen.
I am deeply honoured to be in Mozambique.
Allow me to thank you, Mr. Governor, for the kind invitation to visit Maputo province, and for the warmth of the welcome, which has been extended to us today.
As neighbours, we are bound by a common border, by history and by ties of culture and language. For many of our people, each other's country is a second home.
For all these reasons we share beliefs and aspirations, and most importantly a commitment to freedom, justice and respect for human dignity.
In pursuit of these noble ideals, Mozambique and her people made an enormous contribution to our struggle for liberation, defiant of pressure and violent attacks from a much more powerful neighbour.
South Africa is now well into its seventh year of freedom. This Mozambique helped make possible. Freed from apartheid and destabilisation, South Africa and Mozambique can join hands to work for the mutual benefit of our peoples.
We can work with the rest of our region to build it into a powerful force for development, contributing to the rebirth of Africa and making its mark in the world.
I am confident that this opportunity for discussion and exchanges of ideas will lead to even closer co-operation between our countries and our peoples towards these goals.
A relationship born out of a common yearning for freedom at the turn of the century can at last become a partnership for peace and prosperity.
Ombregado
I thank you!