President Cyril Ramaphosa believes his interactions with business leaders in Canada will yield positive results for the country moving forward. He was speaking after his arrival at the G7 Summit in Quebec City, Canada on Friday night, after meeting with investors in Toronto earlier in the day.
The President will participate in the outreach segment of the summit of the world’s most industrialised economies along with other invited heads of state from mainly the developing world, with bilateral meetings planned with the leaders of France, Canada and Germany, but not the United States.
Ramaphosa arrived on a chartered SAA flight and went straight into charm offensive with business leaders as he seeks to fortify his ambitious bid to raise $100 billion in new money for the country in five years.
“We had a wonderful exchange of views with business leaders, well over 130 leaders and the occasion was oversold – which shows a great new interest in the affairs of our country and particularly South Africa. They recognise the new period we are in, the new dawn, the new era and they are warming up to SA and in particular in relation to regaining their level of confidence in what is happening in our country, the way we’re moving the country forward, the stability that is being engendered in the country and of course the response of our people.”
He will join other African leaders from Rwanda, Kenya, Senegal and the Seychelles in the outreach segment of the G7 that will focus on the oceans economy; recognised as an important growth pole for the country.
“Well a successful discussion is possibly threefold, the interaction that we’ve had with business in Toronto has been wonderful. It will yield really good results in the investment fold. Tomorrow our interaction on the outreach side of the G7 with a number of other African countries will be putting forward the African story – and of course the bilateral meetings that we’re going to have with a number of important countries in the world like Canada, France and Germany. So that is important for us because that is where the money is, we want to bring the money back to South Africa,” says Ramaphosa.
After a bilateral meeting with his US counterpart, French President Emmanuel Macron had this to say: “I wanted to thank President Trump. I think we had a very open and direct discussion this afternoon, we always had this kind of discussion. And I think on trade, there is a critical path, but there is no progress altogether. We had a very direct and open discussion, and I thought a willingness on all the sides to find an agreement and have a win-win approach for our people, our workers, our middle classes.”
President Donald Trump, after tense exchanges on twitter leading up to the summit, appeared less combative.
As G7 and invited leaders gather on Saturday for discussion on climate change, President Trump will depart for a summit in Singapore with North Korea’s leader Kim Jong UN.
