KIGALI, Rwanda — Commonwealth Heads of Government ended their 26th biannual meeting here on Saturday with a declaration to tackle some of the major challenges facing member states.

The 2022 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) was held under the theme ‘Delivering a Common Future: Connecting, Innovating, Transforming’ and concluded with the release of a lengthy communiqué that was noticeably short on timelines for action.

This was the first CHOGM in four years because of the novel coronavirus pandemic and the heads of governments emerged from several closed-door meetings with an acceptance that at a time of uneven recovery from COVID-19, new threats to economic security and political stability in the international system, and when many across the Commonwealth are directly and increasingly affected by the impacts of climate change, urgent action is needed.

The heads of government also acknowledged the importance of multilateral cooperation in a rules-based international system and reaffirmed their shared commitment to continue working with the United Nations, other international and regional organisations and international financial institutions, in their responses to these challenges.

Addressing a media briefing at the end of CHOGM on Saturday, Baroness Patricia Scotland, who was returned as head of the Commonwealth Secretariat on Friday, said the leaders reflected on the several challenges facing member countries and in particular the 32 small states.

“A number of new principles, declarations and frameworks were endorsed and you will find them all in our communiqué, but the key to them were the following, the Living Lands Charter…; the Kigali declaration on child care reform; the declaration on sustainable urbanisation; and last but not least, the declaration on gender equality and women’s empowerment,” said Scotland.

“These instruments will serve as guiding frameworks for the work of the Commonwealth in the years ahead,” added Scotland as she underscored that the previous priority areas, such as health, education, and democracy will not be ignored.

Scotland also announced that the Commonwealth has admitted two former French colonies — Gabon and Togo — moving the number of member states to 56, while the communiqué issued by the heads of government noted that the Maldives was welcomed back into the Commonwealth.

The Maldives joined the Commonwealth in 1982 but withdrew its membership in 2016.

It was also announced that the 2024 CHOGM will be held in the Pacific island of Samoa where a representative of Africa is slated to replace Scotland as the head of the Commonwealth Secretariat.