Remarks by President Kgalema Motlanthe to Ambassador Designate of Burkina Faso

Congratulations and welcome Your Excellency. I have no doubt in my mind that your presence here will be fillip to what has hitherto been a very fruitful relationship between our two countries. We have shared the responsibility of serving on behalf of the continent in the United Nations Security Council and through that experience the relationship has really been cemented. Once again, welcome and congratulations. Your presence here is taking this relationship a step further.

Thank you.

Remarks by President Kgalema Motlanthe to Ambassador designate of the Republic of Iceland

Your Excellency welcome and congratulations for you appointment, it is very important. Even though we stand at polar ends of the world I think we stand a good chance of leading the world in terms of environmental challenges. Most important of all I think your presence here will go a long way towards cementing relations between our two nations and our two countries. We assure you of our support. Once again, congratulations and thank you.

Remarks by President Kgalema Motlanthe to Ambassador designate of the Republic of Guinea

Thank you Your Excellency for your kind words and congratulations for the responsibility that President Conte has placed on your shoulders. We welcome you back, we know you have been here before and rest assured that we will give you all the support you need and that our people are ready to welcome you and work with you and take this relationship to a more dynamic level.

We are aware that in the past we were together in the trenches of struggle against colonialism but today we face a different creature altogether which is the struggle to eradicate poverty. To that end I think the trilateral co-operation and projects to cultivate rice and vegetables in Guinea together with the Vietnamese friends is one way of continuing that concerted effort as people who come from the trenches of struggle and that today have with them here as we welcome you on the day of the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence of Guinea. We celebrate with you. Welcome.

Remarks by President Kgalema Motlanthe to Ambassador Designate of the Republic of Italy

Congratulations. It is with a sense of ambivalence that I welcome you this morning because of the sad loss of your predecessor whom I knew very well and worked very closely with in the course of my work but also happy that you Your Excellency are here to replace him. I have no doubt in my mind that you will continue the good work that he did, to continue to cement the relations between our people and our countries.

As you said the city of Meluriggio supported our liberation efforts. In fact our late President in the ANC Oliver Tambo was always well received and in the years when the ANC was a banned organisation, we produced the highest awards of the ANC Isitwalandwe/Seaparankoe in Italy.

With regards to the 2010 FIFA Soccer World Cup, incidentally one of our best soccer exports in 1958, Steve Mokone played for Dorino and it was a big team in Europe and he scored five goals on his debut game. I hope that in our exchanges we will be able to give the necessary boost to our national team so that come 2010 we can end up in the finals and perhaps even win the trophy for Africa.

Thank you once again.

Remarks by President Kgalema Motlanthe to Ambassador Designate of the Republic of Cuba

Congratulations Your Excellency. Welcome. It is really my honour to welcome you back. South Africa has been your second home away from home. So welcome back.