KAMPALA – Equatoria Guinea President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo is expected in the country on Friday for a two-day state visit.
Mr Nguema, who comes at the invitation of his President Yoweri Museveni, is set to visit Kiryandongo refugee settlement centre in his capacity as the ambassador of the African Union Convention for the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons in Africa.
Equatorial Guinea joined South Sudan as the second country to accede this year to the AU Convention for the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons in Africa, which was signed in Kampala.
The Kampala Convention is the world’s first and only regional legally binding instrument for the protection and assistance of IDPs who often face heightened risks, violations and sexual violence because of their displacement while they struggle to access their rights and basic protection.
Mr Nguema will also tour Panyandoli Health Centre III, Panyandoli vocation school and Kiryandongo hospital to have a firsthand experience on how Uganda has handled the refugee situation.
Accession to the Kampala Convention is an affirmation by states of their primary responsibility to protect, assist and provide solutions for IDPs. The Convention also calls for national and regional actions to prevent arbitrary displacement, to ensure IDPs are protected and assisted, and to support durable solutions.
Mr Nguema has been President of Equatorial Guinea since 1979. He ousted his uncle, Francisco Macías Nguema, in an August 1979 military coup and has overseen Equatorial Guinea’s emergence as an important oil producer, beginning in the 1990s.