The photograph of Botswana’s Elias Mpedi Magosi, South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa and Eswatini’s King Mswati III captures more than a routine change of leadership within the Southern African Development Community (SADC).
It brings together three figures with very different political backgrounds at a moment when the region is being forced to confront an uncomfortable contradiction between its ambitions for integration and growing tensions over migration and belonging.
This analysis draws on recent SADC summit developments, official regional statements and reporting on migration and xenophobia in South Africa to examine what the new leadership configuration could mean for the future of regional integration.
Magosi has been reappointed SADC Executive Secretary for a second four-year term, providing continuity within the organisation’s administrative machinery.
Ramaphosa has assumed the SADC Chairpersonship, placing South Africa at the political centre of the regional bloc.
King Mswati III, meanwhile, has taken over leadership of the SADC Organ on Politics, Defence and Security Cooperation, responsible for major regional peace and security issues.
On the surface, the arrangement represents a normal transition in SADC leadership. Politically, however, it creates an intriguing regional triangle involving a technocrat, an elected president heading Southern Africa’s largest economy and a monarch leading the bloc’s political and security organ.
The deeper significance lies in the circumstances surrounding South Africa’s new chairmanship.
SADC has consistently promoted regional integration, economic cooperation, peace and security and the movement of people and goods.
Yet South Africa continues to face challenges associated with xenophobia and anti-immigrant sentiment, particularly towards nationals from neighbouring African countries.
That creates a difficult question for Ramaphosa: how can South Africa champion regional integration while dealing with domestic political and social pressures that sometimes portray migrants as a threat?
The contradiction is perhaps best captured in one sentence: SADC speaks the language of one region, while sections of the street continue to speak the language of exclusion.
South Africa’s historical position makes the issue even more significant. During the struggle against apartheid, neighbouring countries played an important role in supporting South African liberation movements and hosting South African exiles.
Southern Africa’s political solidarity was therefore built partly on the recognition that national borders should not prevent countries from standing together against oppression.
Decades later, the region is confronted by a different reality, in which citizens from those same neighbouring countries can find themselves facing hostility when they enter South Africa.
For a Malawian trader in Johannesburg, a Zimbabwean farm worker in Limpopo or a Mozambican construction worker in Gauteng, regional integration is not experienced through summit communiqués. It is experienced at borders, workplaces, hospitals, markets and schools.
This makes migration a central test of whether SADC integration is becoming meaningful to ordinary people.
Economic integration also presents a paradox.
South Africa remains a major economic destination for migrants from across the region.
Foreign workers and entrepreneurs participate in agriculture, construction, hospitality, logistics, domestic work, retail and other sectors.
Cross-border traders also form an important part of the regional economy.
Consequently, regional economic integration cannot be separated completely from the movement of people.
A region cannot easily promote deeper economic cooperation while treating the movement of African workers, traders and professionals as an inherently negative phenomenon.
This is where Ramaphosa’s SADC chairmanship could become particularly important.
His challenge will be to demonstrate that South Africa’s regional leadership is not confined to economic diplomacy.
It must also address issues that affect relations between ordinary citizens of SADC member states.
That does not mean SADC should interfere in South Africa’s domestic politics. Rather, it means the regional bloc can encourage cooperation on migration, strengthen mechanisms for protecting people against xenophobic violence and promote legal pathways for citizens who move across borders for employment, business, education and family reasons.
Magosi’s continued leadership of the Secretariat could provide important institutional continuity.
His role is not to represent South African interests but to advance the collective objectives of SADC.
His second term therefore gives the organisation an opportunity to maintain momentum on regional integration regardless of changes in individual member states.
The Secretariat could use this period to strengthen practical cooperation on cross-border trade, recognition of professional qualifications, migration procedures and social-security arrangements.
Such reforms could help reduce some of the uncertainty surrounding migration.
When legal migration systems are slow, complicated or expensive, more people may find themselves operating outside formal structures. That can fuel public resentment and provide political groups with opportunities to blame migrants for wider economic and social problems.
The appointment of King Mswati III to chair the Organ on Politics, Defence and Security Cooperation adds another dimension to the debate.
Traditionally, regional security discussions have focused on armed conflicts, unconstitutional changes of government, political instability and threats to state authority.
But the concept of security is increasingly broader.
The security of ordinary people should also matter.
A migrant trader who fears violence because of nationality faces a security problem. A foreign worker who fears losing employment because of xenophobic intimidation faces a human-security problem.
A person prevented from accessing essential services because of nationality faces a problem that can ultimately affect regional stability.
This suggests that the SADC Organ could expand its understanding of security beyond governments and armed conflicts to include human security, social cohesion and protection of vulnerable communities.
The apparent contradiction surrounding the new leadership could therefore become an opportunity.
Ramaphosa’s position gives SADC an opportunity to place regional integration at the centre of South Africa’s domestic and foreign-policy conversation.
Magosi provides institutional continuity, while Mswati III could help broaden discussions within the security Organ towards human security.
The region should, however, move beyond criticism.
It needs practical solutions.
One possible idea is the development of a SADC Citizenship Compact—a regional policy framework that could define what citizens of member states should reasonably expect when they lawfully cross borders within the region.
Such a framework could consider clearer pathways to regularisation, stronger protection against nationality-based discrimination, easier movement for legitimate workers and traders, and safeguards for access to essential services.
SADC could also consider mechanisms to support communities hosting significant migrant populations.
Local frustrations over pressure on housing, healthcare, education and employment should be addressed through investment and better planning rather than by turning migrants into convenient scapegoats.
The objective should be to protect migrants while also supporting host communities.
Southern Africa’s borders may divide countries politically, but families, cultures, businesses and economies have always crossed those boundaries.
A Zimbabwean worker contributing to South Africa’s economy, a Malawian trader travelling to Johannesburg, a Mozambican family with relatives in South Africa or a Zambian company trading with South African businesses are all part of the same regional economic and social system.
These relationships should be recognised as assets rather than threats.
The greatest danger is when political rhetoric turns regional interdependence into suspicion.
Once neighbouring citizens are routinely portrayed as criminals, competitors or unwanted outsiders, the social foundation of regional integration begins to weaken.
That is why the photograph of Magosi, Ramaphosa and Mswati III deserves to be viewed as more than a ceremonial image.
It should be viewed as a challenge to the new SADC leadership.
Can these three leaders help close the gap between SADC as an institution and Southern Africa as a society?
Can they make regional integration meaningful to ordinary citizens rather than limiting it to presidents, ministers, diplomats and
business leaders?
Can they help create a region where a Southern African citizen is not automatically regarded as an outsider simply because he or she crosses an international boundary?
And can South Africa demonstrate that being the region’s largest economic power also comes with a responsibility to protect regional solidarity?
The answers will help determine how the 2026–2027 SADC leadership is remembered.
Its greatest achievement would not necessarily be another summit communiqué filled with commitments to integration.
It would be a region where lawful movement across borders becomes easier, migrants are protected, host communities receive support and xenophobia is recognised as a challenge to regional peace, economic cooperation and social cohesion.
The photograph is uncomfortable because it captures a reality Southern Africa can no longer ignore:
Political integration has moved faster than social integration.
The leaders are already standing together.
The question is whether the people will eventually be allowed to stand together too.
Feedback and Responses:
Your feedback matters. What is your view on the new SADC leadership and the region’s approach to migration, xenophobia and regional integration? Do you agree that SADC needs a stronger framework to protect citizens moving across member states?
Send your comments, suggestions or professional feedback to:
Phone/WhatsApp: +265 884 433 313
Email: bonnetmunthali2101@gmail.com
Leave a Reply