By Bongiwe Dlamini

MBABANE:Mlungisi Makhanya,the President of eSwatini’s main and largest political party, the People’s United Democratic Movement(PUDEMO) has called upon the government to speed-up a process of establishing diplomatic relations with China.

Eswatini is the only country in Africa with no diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China(PRC) and economic experts say, this has delayed development in the country and worsened the poverty situation,as establishing same would have long created jobs and enhance economic growth through infrastructure development.

When delivering the political organization’s end of year statement on Tuesday evening, the PUDEMO President maintained that, Taiwan remains the province of China.

“PUDEMO recognizes and fully supports the one-China principle  and calls upon the Swaziland government to stop recognizing the separatist forces for “Taiwan independence”. There is but one China in the world, Taiwan is an inalienable part of China’s territory, and the Government of the People’s Republic of China is the sole legal government representing the whole of China. This has been clearly recognized by United Nations General Assembly Resolution 2758 of 1971. Since the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, 182 countries have established diplomatic relations with China on the basis of the one-China principle. The one-China principle is a universal consensus of the international community, and Swaziland remains the only pariah in the continent to have diplomatic relations with the province of Taiwan.

PUDEMO pledges her full support to His Excellency, President Xi Jinping, and his government on their reunification mission of the Chinese people on both sides of the Taiwan Straits. We commit to play our part in ensuring that the peaceful national reunification exercise, informed by the one-China principle and the 1992 Consensus is realized sooner.PUDEMO will accelerate its effort in deepening the people-to- people relations between the people of Swaziland and the people of China with the view of ultimately setting up formal diplomatic relations”, said the PUDEMO President.