SCECSAL 2020 conference postponed

Some NIWA members at the official launch of the
SCECSAL 2020 conference  in Windhoek, Namibia on
4 February 2020

The XXIVth Standing Conference of Eastern, Central and Southern African Library and Information Association (dubbed SCECSAL 2020) scheduled for 20-24 April 2020 in Windhoek, Namibia has been postponed until further notice.

The Namibian Information Workers Associations (NIWA), the SCECSAL member Association that was to host the conference, took the decision to postpone the conference on 12 March.

The postponement of the conference comes after a meeting of the SCECSAL General Council on 11 March at which an unanimous decision was taken to postpone the meeting, following the review of on ongoing developments in the spread of coronavirus (COVID-19) across the globe and the concerns expressed by the SCECSAL member Associations.

In related developments,  on 11 March the Namibia Minister of Health, Dr Kalumbi Shangula, advised Namibians to avoid face-to-face meetings with international participants to minimize chances of contracting covid-19, and later in the evening on the same day, the World Health Organization (WHO) Director General, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, declared the covid-19 a pandemic, both events gave strong justification to the SCECSAL General Council’s proposal to postpone the conference.

NIWA and the SCECSAL Secretariat will monitor the developments and, in due course, propose the new dates for the conference.

SCECSAL member Associations that took part in the General Council meeting were:

• Eswatini Library Association (ESWALA)
• Library and Information Association of South Africa (LIASA)
• Library and Information Association of Zambia (LIAZ)
• Lesotho Library Association (LLA)
• Malawi Library Association (MALA)
• Namibia Library and Information Workers Association (NIWA)
• Tanzania Library Association (TLA)

For further information and clarifications, please contact the SCECSAL Secretariat at scecsal.secretariat@gmail.com.