After consideration of the recommendations made in the study by the meeting of senior officials, the report was workshopped nationally by member states. A regional workshop was convened in Gaberone towards the end of 1997, in order to advise the Council of Ministers on the implementation of the study. However, it is felt that the findings and recommendations are `controversial' and `radical', and little progress has been made in preparing for the implementation of the proposals.9 Further discussion was postponed until the January 1998 SADC Council of Ministers Meeting in Maputo. The process of building consensus on the rationalisation of SADC is bound to be long and arduous not least because a leaner and more efficient SADC may threaten vested interests, established over the past seventeen years, within the various SADC national contact ministries. The final model accepted by SADC may therefore differ significantly from that contained in the recommendations.

The general thrust of the report also indicates a shift from SADC as a government institution, towards a more private sector driven process of co-operation and integration in which all stakeholders should be involved. The business-like approach to the pursuit of SADC objectives is evident in the use and recommendation of concepts such as `cost-effectiveness', `outsourcing', `systems for portfolio management', `ideal skills profiles', `mixtures of market mechanisms and interventionist policies', `partnership with the private sector', and `investment prospectus'.

The authors graphically summarised, as their point of departure, the objectives of SADC which are supposed to be achieved through the SPA. These are (correctly) derived from the SADC Treaty, and include the evolution of common political values, systems, and institutions; and the promotion and defence of peace and security. However, the pursuit of the latter was not addressed anywhere in the report. The authors also omitted a number of other key provisions of the SADC Treaty in briefly outlining the fundamental point of departure for their study. For example, they did not refer to the principles of SADC, upon which the Community's objectives are based. Article 4 states that, "SADC and its Member States shall act in accordance with the following principles:

a) sovereign equality of all Member States;

b) solidarity, peace and security;

c) human rights, democracy, and the rule of law;

d) equity, balance and mutual benefit;

e) peaceful settlement of disputes."

Moreover, Article 21 spells out a number of areas of co-operation, including politics, diplomacy, international relations, peace and security.10

While the report admittedly concentrates on development integration, it does so by conveniently ignoring the critical linkage between development and security. This is a serious omission, given the recent history of armed conflict in the region, the legacy of ideological conflict and regional destabilisation of the apartheid era, the fragility of the peace process in Angola, and the extension of SADC to include the Democratic Republic of Congo. Yet, the report does address key issues of concern common to both the political and economic objectives of SADC such as SADC institutional structures and the financing of SADC institutions but it does so in a manner which totally ignores the political principles and objectives of the organisation.

However rational the report may appear from the perspective of development integration, it is deficient when linked to the overarching objectives of SADC. An institution which increasingly operates according to business principles is clearly unsuited to deal with matters of politics, defence and security. This lends credence to the notion that SADC qua SADC is not (or should not be) equipped to deal with issues pertaining to security co-operation and conflict resolution, and that the Organ for Politics, Defence and Security should "function independently from other SADC structures."11