http://www.financialmail.co.za/features/2015/10/08/a-diplomatic-departure

 

CARLOS Sersale di Cerisano, one of Pretoria’s longest-serving diplomats, is bowing out, having represented Argentina in this country since 2006.

In terms of service, he is second only to Bene M’Poko of the Democratic Republic of Congo, who has been an ambassador here for the past 14 years.

"After almost 10 years, and a third of my professional career, it’s time to leave," the affable diplomat told the Financial Mail this week. "But SA is a part of my mind now and whatever I do, I will always be a good representative of this country."

An economist by training, Sersale joined Argentina’s diplomatic corps in the late 1970s and thereafter began a long career as representative to the UN. He spent some years in Rome in the 1980s before relocating to UN headquarters in New York.

Between 2000 and 2005 he returned home to Buenos Aires and then requested a posting in SA.

Relations were nonexistent in those days but "putting the two countries together in terms of a common agenda" was not difficult. "Both are developing countries, they share a similar economic size, have similar international challenges, similar outlooks to human rights."

In his first few years he helped put in place a string of bilateral agreements, in the fields of science and technology, agriculture, defence, nuclear research and sports, and began to grow the trade volume.

In 2005, trade between the two countries sat at US$585m. By 2012 it had hit a high of $1,3bn, though it has since dropped back to about $800m "due to Argentina’s uncompetitive exchange rates".

Exports from Argentina include wheat, chicken, vegetable oils and spare parts for the automobile industry, while the bulk of exports from SA to the South American country are phosphates, coal, iron materials, cardboard and tin cans.

While he can take some credit for the performance of bilateral trade, Sersale was less successful when it came to convincing SAA not to pull the direct flight between OR Tambo and Buenos Aires in 2014, something he views as a "political move" that made little or no business sense. (SA had recently become a member of Brics and Brazil thus became the destination of choice.)

Sersale used every media platform at that time telling anyone who would listen to him that the route was the airline’s most successful international one "with 72% occupancy", but SAA forged ahead regardless.

"It was a heroic battle, but we lost."

And at great expense, it would seem. Traveller numbers from Argentina have consequently plummeted from 58 000 in 2013 (17 000 of whom had a final destination in SA) to a third of that today.

Those figures affect not only tourism but business, technical co-operation between the two countries and sports, an area that Sersale has also pushed since 2005.

Prior to the axing of the Buenos Aires flight, more than 100 tournaments were taking place between the two countries each year.

Not only a great soccer nation (and home of the legendary Diego Maradona), Argentina has a rugby force to be reckoned with in Los Pumas.

In 2007, in the run-up to the World Cup final in Paris where SA would beat England, former president Thabo Mbeki invited Sersale to travel with him to the game. But rather than rub salt in a very fresh wound (the Boks had just beaten Los Pumas in the semis), Mbeki instead talked about the importance of the World Cup coming back to the so-called South.

That trip helped forge an even better relationship between the two countries and it continued so into the era of Jacob Zuma that followed.

However, lately many ambassadors in Pretoria have been bemoaning the poor access they have to government seniors, or how visiting ministers are often snubbed by their SA counterparts, to the point of damaging relations.

Others criticise the country’s foreign policy as rudderless, or speak of the lack of direction provided by international relations & co-operation minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane.

Sersale sees it differently, or perhaps diplomatically. "Mbeki had a global vision. What I see lately is SA foreign policy dedicating more time to Africa, and that is something instrumental that cannot be criticised.

"All I can say is that in the case of Argentina, there have been no changes and the priorities between our two countries remain the same. When it comes to access, I also cannot complain. We get access when we request it."

Sersale returns to Argentina early in November.