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Reducing economic dependency, especially but not only on apartheid South Africa,
was one of the overarching objectives and motivating factors for the formation of SADC.
Did SADC succeed in creating new viable alternative transport routes? Infrastructure de-
velopment is a long term process as projects in this sector often require substantial amounts
of money and generally have a long gestation period. There have been some gains but
more still needs to be done.
For example, the expansion of the Walvis Bay port and current efforts at developing
ports in Mozambique as well as the development of seamless road, railway and fuel pipe-
lines in Zimbabwe and Botswana that will eventually link the east coast to the west coast,
providing options for the landlinked countries of the region. An ambitious roadmap to ad-
dress the infrastructure deficit in the region was put in place with the approval of the Re-
gional Infrastructure Development Master Plan in Maputo in 2012. Less than three years
later, in 2015, SADC reviewed and revised its priorities to focus on industrial development,
gradually building the future through a modern and integrated development plan for pros-
perity in the 21 century.
st
Institutionally, the organisation had a loose structure at its formative phase, with a
non-binding legal framework while its institutions were largely decentralised among the
Member States, as each was assigned responsibility for the development of a particular
sector without vesting power in a centralised body. Thus sectors were allocated to Member
States with each hosting a Sector Coordinating Unit. These sectors were responsible for
guiding regional policies and programmes.
A year after formation of the SADCC, the institution was formalised by means of a
Memorandum of Understanding on the Institutions of the Southern African Development
Coordination Conference dated 20 July 1981. Article 1(a-e) of the Memorandum of Under- 143
standing establishing SADCC created the governance structure comprising a Summit, Council
of Ministers, Sectoral Commissions, Standing Committee of Officials, and a Secretariat. This
was a decentralised structure based on a minimal level of institutional arrangement. The lean
central structure meant that Member States had to shoulder the financial burden of imple-
mentation of policy decisions through the coordination of given sectors.
The transformation from SADCC to the Southern African Development Commu-
nity (SADC) through the SADC Treaty and Declaration of 1992 gave the body a new
legal structure with a binding obligation to implement regional agreements while new sec-
tor specific organisations were created to oversee implementation of agreed policies and
programmes. With Namibia gaining independence in 1990 and the tide shifting against
apartheid South Africa, the 1992 SADC Treaty brought with it a shift in ideological incli-
nation predicated on the promotion of greater interdependence among Member States
with the ultimate objective of deepening regional integration.
Although SADCC transformed to SADC in 1992, a review of the regional body
reveals that the institutional structure remained largely unchanged. This state of affairs
meant that the regional body and its institutions were less effective in driving the regional
integration agenda. This realisation led to an institutional reform process which combined
the previously nationally based sectors and commissions into six directorates, which have
since been rearranged into 10 directorates and eight standalone units as provided for under
Article 15 (4&5) of the SADC Treaty. The objective of the restructuring was to enhance
the effectiveness and efficiency for coordination and monitoring of implementation.
The 1992 transformation did not only bring about a new legal framework but also
an institutional shift through the Treaty and Declaration. As from 2000, SADC undertook
an exercise to restructure its institutions and at an Extra-Ordinary Summit of 9 March 2001
in Windhoek, Namibia, the SADC Treaty Amendment (2001) was adopted to give legal force
to the reforms. The reforms established eight institutions, under the guidance of Article 9 of
the Treaty Amendment, including the Summit of Heads of State or Government, Organ
on Politics, Defence and Security Co-operation, Council of Ministers, a Secretariat, a Tribu-
nal, the Troika, Standing Committee of Officials and the SADC National Committees.