I would like to thank the Commission for making a global dialog of Africans possible. The content and direction of both documents are generally on-point, and deserve the support of all Africans globally, and all people of good will across ethnic, national, religion and other differences that define the various sectors of humanity.
If I might be permitted to take the liberty of citing some of the Commissionâs points as a preface to my humble observations; the Commission writes:
âBut how do we attain this objective? The strategic framework and the future programme document trace the roadmap that we have to follow.
The resources that we need for the integrated Africa to become a force to be reckoned with, a force that we can all rely upon, include, among other things, the political will to achieve integration, the leadership and commitment of the Commission, the accession of the people to the integration endeavour, the optimal use of all our assets, namely, our population, culture, languages, dialogue, our economies, and our human and financial resources.
âFirst of all, our states, because this is where we should find our human and financial resources. Then, we have the people of Africa, since there can be no integration, except one that is desired and driven by the people. Lastly, we have the organs of the Union.
âWe cannot devise a credible project for Africa with the shortcomings of the past. With adequate, sustainable and fresh resources, the Organs of the
Union have to submit themselves to the logic of enterprise governance. This means that they have to be more demanding with themselves, develop their own performance indicators, and commit themselves to producing agreed results within set deadlines.
âOn this score, the Commission needs to promote, the values of integrity and mutual respect, particularly respect for women, and foster solidarity and unalloyed commitment to the cause of the African Union.â
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âWe are then left with the scenario of an assertive Africa. In this scenario, we have an Africa which charts its own vision of the future, builds its own values, reinvents new solidarities, trains and educates itself in order to achieve without delay its integration endeavour, a pre ârequisite for the Continentâs emergence as an economic and strategic hub. This scenario is perfectly in consonance with Pan-Africanism which rallied the Founding Fathers of the OAU in 1963 and their successors forty years later, who through the African Union initiative, assumed the generational task of positioning the Continent on the path of a richer future, a future which will embody the notions of decentralization, citizenship, democracy, growth and solidarity.â
ââ Africa is paying a huge price for the inadequacy of its strategies, and at the threshold of this millennium, which is being celebrated as the millennium of expertise and knowledge, the Continent finds itself with the lowest human development index in the world, an index that is immensely correlated with poverty which, in the final analysis, it constitutes the cause and effect. As a result of this state of massive poverty which is aggravated or caused by inadequate access to social services, African populations live under very difficult conditions and, in most cases, people are stretched to the limit of survival.â
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âSocial and political factors also help to explain this economic stagnation. A further factor is the nature of the demographic situation in Africa. However, analysts agree that development is obstructed halted by political constraints, prominent among which are the following:
Institutional instability symbolized particularly by coups dâÃtat: Africa experienced 186 coups dâÃtat between 1956 and 2001, half of which took place in the 80s and 90s. The question may be asked as to whether the policy of denationalization of the 80s, coupled with changes in international aid priorities, have not helped to drive the momentum of delegitimization and disintegration of the established order
Upsurge of new forms of atrocities in conflict areas which should be seen as heinous crimes (a reference to hands and arms being chopped off, and cannibalistic practices) perpetrated mainly against women and children;
Exacerbation of identity pressures (ethnic and religious) â ethnicism â culminating in genocide, particularly in Rwanda in 1994;
Disparities within social groups;
Gender inequalities, in all their forms;
Authoritarian and indeed autocratic nature of some regimes;
Management of public affairs as a personal estate;
Legal and judicial insecurity; etc.
â
âWe should further point out that religion constitutes a vital part of our culture, our tradition and way of life. It is crucial that it should not be exploited for political ends and that we should make the best of it. In the same vein, we should divest ourselves from obscurantist practices which are increasingly taking place under the guise of religion.
âIt is on the strength of the aforementioned observations that Africaâs political leaders arrived at two major conclusions. The first is that economic integration should be considered as an imperative, a vital tool for speeding up economic development. In the first place, the affirmation of a common will for integration is likely to reduce, and indeed eliminate, the sources of violent conflicts. Additionally, the widening of domestic markets and the harmonization of regulatory frameworks would help create an environment conducive to the profitability of possible or future investments in Africa.
âClearly, it would be necessary to take other measures to reduce poverty phenomenon and initiate an accelerated sustainable development in Africa. These measures have significant social or political dimensions, relating as they do to the mode of functioning of societies and the attendant management of public affairs. However, integration of economies remains a sine-qua-non to stimulate growth, without which development will remain illusory.
âThe second conclusion emanating from the analysis of Africaâs realities is that socio-political variables impact considerably on economic processes, since in Africa, the economies are built into the society; hence the current widely held view that peace, security, stability, improving political and economic governance and the pursuit of the democratization process should be elevated to Africaâs priority agenda. Without these issues, economic integration will undoubtedly be illusory, and economic progress precarious.â
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ââ There is growing consensus that, like in other regions of the world, peace and development in Africa go hand in hand; that peace is another name for development; and that respect for the cultural, sociological, ethnic and linguistic diversity that characterizes the countries of the Continent is Number One prerequisite. In the same vein, there is an increasingly vocal recognition by Africans of the inextricable linkage between economic, social, political, environmental, cultural and technological issues in the development process, and also the recognition of the need to henceforth adopt a holistic approach to these issues.â
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â For instance, the concept of sustainable human development has been understood by African governments and development experts as the widening of the opportunities offered to citizens to meet their material, political and cultural needs in a context of recognized diversity and guaranteed pluralism.
âThis paradigm renewal is imbued with numerous seeds of change conducive to development in the African context. It is noteworthy, among these seeds of change, that even if intra-African trade has remained modest and Africa is inadequately integrated into global trade, despite its natural riches (petroleum, gold, etc.) â it is not, by that token, all that much marginalized. It is, whatever the case, determined to take all the necessary measures to register a greater presence in the global market, thanks not only to increased investments and productivity, but also to more equitable and more just bilateral or multilateral agreements. It is equally noteworthy that the ingenuity exhibited in the informal sector, also known as the peoplesâ economy, could under some conditions, be put to use to improve the productivity and, by that token, the income and well-being of the people, without forgetting that it can also help conquer the world market. Lastly, it is noteworthy that, cognizant of the domination to which their Continent is subjected, Africans in their growing numbers now believe and affirm that their future depends primarily on themselves, and are convinced that their continent can regain its proper place in the world, through a societal project formulated in a participatory manner and appropriated without complex; a just, united and energetic society.â
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ââThis feeling which prevails among many Africans, and which could be described as afro-responsibility, consists in the assertion that, despite the domination to which their continent has been subjected, Africans can regain their proper place in the world, through a societal project formulated in a participatory manner and appropriated without complex; a society united and virile built on the ideals and justice.â
These few excerpts from the two documents speak well to the insight and vision of the AU leadership, as reflected in the work and thought of the Commission.
However, I would like to raise one issue. An issue that is perhaps considered an anachronism by some in the AU; and a matter to be avoided at all cost by the majority of the leadership of Africa. That is the question of the construction of a continental federal government. First allow me to say that centralization is not in and of itself bad. Centralization of political power at the federal and national power is the key to the success of the United States of America, leaving aside the question of the probity and ethical nature of the US society, it is undeniably true that the commercial success of the US federal state is a direct function of the proficiency of the system put in place by itâs federal constitution.
The great pioneers of Pan-Africanism argued cogently for a continental government that would be the tool and servant of the peoples themselves. None more eloquently than Dr. Kwame Nkrumah who pointed out that a big part of the success of western businesses were largely the consequences of their strategy of exploiting Africa as a single compact entity: He demonstrated that we required a political structure and system that would facilitate our operation on a Pan-African scale: a Union Government. He helped us to understand that the western mega-business enterprises succeeded in exploiting the wealth of because they were committed to:
â... acting on a Pan-African scale. By means of interlocking directorships, cross-shareholdings and other devices, groups of apparently
different companies have formed, in fact, one enormous capitalist monopoly. The only effective way to challenge this economic empire and to recover
possession of our heritage, is for us also to act on a Pan-African basis, through a Union Government.
No one would suggest that if all the peoples of Africa combined to establish their unity their decision could be revoked by the forces of neo-colonialism.
On the contrary, faced with a new situation, those who practice neo-colonialism would adjust themselves to this new balance of world forces
in exactly the same way as the capitalist world has in the past adjusted itself to any other change in the balance of power."
p. 259, "Neo-Colonialism The Last Stage of Imperialism," Dr. Kwame Nkrumah
He constantly reminded us that if we wish to achieve our own prosperity; and cultural and social development we must boldly create the means and ways necessary to do so:
âIt is said, of course that we have no capital, no industrial skill, no communications, no internal markets, and that we cannot even agree among ourselves how best to utilize our resources for our own social needs."
"Yet all the stock exchanges in the world are pre-occupied with Africa's gold, diamonds, uranium, platinum, copper and iron ores. Our capital flows out in streams to irrigate the whole system of Western economy. Fifty-two per cent of the gold in Fort Knox at this moment, where the USA stores its bullion, is believed to have originated from our shores. Africa provides more than 60 per cent of the world's gold. A great deal of the uranium for nuclear power, of copper for electronics, of titanium for supersonic projectiles, of iron and steel for heavy industries, of other minerals and raw materials for lighter industries the basic economic might of the foreign Powers comes from our continent."
"Experts have estimated that the Congo Basin alone can produce enough food crops to satisfy the requirements of nearly half the population of the whole world and here we sit talking about regionalism, talking about gradualism, talking about step by step. Are you afraid to tackle the bull by the horn?"
from Address to the Conference of African Heads of State and Government, May 24, 63
We know that there are exogenous and endogenous circles who do not wish to see Africa prosper, circles that hope to keep African society in a state of chaos. Some do so for sheer profit alone, some for geopolitical reasons, and others for a combination of profit and geopolitical objectives. Whatever the motivation, it boils down to an attack on our efforts to institutionalize a system that would engender and guarantee the constant improvement in the quality of our lives. There are elements in old Europe, North America and other parts of the world, even among our own people, that wishes to see us remain poor, weak and helpless. These elements pursue the realization and/or continuation of our abysmal state so that they can continue to live like emperors, and members of the emperorsâ court, while we starve to death, and work ourselves to death, for these very same modern day emperors
History has shown that the law of empires is the law of brute force. If we are going to mean what we say when we talk about the law serving justice, then we must stand up to those who would destroy societies and the rule of law. These barbarians who flaunt and denigrate international and local law alike, do not want market systems that are equitable and fair. They want to preserve the world we inhabit today, a world that is like some hideous dream, a nightmare of inequity and inequality; a global society of unfair trade and wide scale exploitation and military bullying by the powerful.
Those of us who are advocates of Continental Union government believe that Africa cannot staunch the proliferation of undemocratic and autocratic regimes, corruption, coups, crime, fight pandemic disease, poverty, environmental degradation and the other detrimental aspects of our current circumstances unless we give the African people credible and effective means to affect the âownership by the people of the issue of African integrationâ the Commission rightly cites. We believe that Africa cannot realize âits potentials,â nor âpool its resources,â nor critically âevaluate its own weaknesses,â nor âbe involved and participate fully in global trade,â on a just and equitable basis without the power and capacity of a central federal government.
We are convince that all of our efforts to halt the continued marginalization of Africa and African people, a process that not only is detrimental to us but threatens to tear global business, and global society, to shreds, and endangers global peace. Unless Africa addresses the need to create the central political organs accountable exclusively to the African people themselves, we can foresee nothing but continued chaos and underdevelopment for our beloved continent and her long suffering peoples scattered across the face of the earth.
