TOMRIC News Agency (Dar es Salaam)
Nasilimika Sanga
16 April 2001
Dar Es Salaam — A proposal to launch a United States of Africa is now legally feasible after a required column of Organization of African Unity (OAU) being ratified the treaty.
OAU Secretary-General Dr. Salim Ahmed Salim has said here that two thirds of the envisaged members have ratified the treaty for the establishment of the new African Union.
Speaking at the commemoration of the 76th anniversary of the birthday of former President of Tanzania, late Julius Kambarage Nyerere over the weekend, Dr. Salim said the pace and momentum of continental unity had now gathered speed.
The ratification by more than two third of OAU's 53 members countries or 36 states was required for the launch of the Union. Dr. Salim said here that two-thirds of OAU member states have ratified the Constitutive Act thereby ensuring that the dream of establishing an African Union will soon be a reality.
According to him thirty days after received all required instruments of ratification, the Constitute Act would enter into force and the foundation for the union would have been laid. The Union would comprise a range of pan-African bodies including a parliament, central bank, monetary fund and court of justice. Libyan President, Col. Muammar Gaddafi first floated the idea of an African Union loosely modeled on its European counterpart at an OAU extraordinary summit in 1999.
African leaders have since overwhelmingly supported the idea for a continental union, hoping that their countries could act with greater cohesion and avoid ignored by developed countries.
Libyan civil societies and scholars are now touring in-groups in various African countries to promote the recently proclaimed African Union.
Libyan civil and scholar groups are now touring Africa in four groups and their tour will reach northern, southern, eastern, western and central African states.
The volunteers assigned for the East Africa region visited Uganda and Tanzania last week and during their stay they managed to meet all groups and people they were interested.
The African Union brings together the 1963 Treaty for the Establishment of OAU and the 1991 Agreement for the establishment of the Economic Community of Africa. The initiatives started several decades ago. It started more than four decades ago by a number of African leaders such as Julius Kambarage Nyerere of Tanzania, Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, Ahmed Seko Toure of Guinea and Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya.
Already the United Nations Development Program's (UNDP) Independent Commission on the Third Millennium for Africa is processing a proposal to establish the Nyerere Prize for exemplary ethical conduct in public services in honor of Nyerere.
The Commission is a Cotonou-based body of 25 prominent African citizens, who have been charged with the formulation of a vision for African development in the course of the 21st century. An endowment fund ultimately reaching about 60 million US dollars could be created by African governments, corporations and philanthropists and the proceeds fund could be given out as national and Pan African awards for meritorious ethical conduct in public service.
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