MFI/Radio France Internationale (Paris)
Marie Joannidis
3 July 2002
analysis
Durban, South Africa — Organizing a Union for Africa - Durban 2002 (3 of 11))
It has taken nearly 40 years for Africa to replace the Organization of African Unity (OAU), the only forum for Pan-African dialogue, by what should one day become a genuine political and economic union along the lines of the European Union : the African Union (UA).
Today the 53 member states of the OAU - founded in 1963 by some thirty countries, a few of them freshly independent - have to clearly define the new institutions of their Union which is meeting at Summit level for the first time in Durban from July 8 to 10.
Underlying this institutional change is the awareness gained by Africans of the need to better coordinate their efforts so as to be heard on the international scene, through regional integration above all. In the past this remained dependent upon the will of the countries concerned and upon regional or internal conflicts tearing them apart. As a result West Africa and Southern Africa have moved faster along the road to integration than other regions of the continent.
A decade ago the countries of the continent adopted a decision in Abuja in 1991 to create an African economic community in stages, and over a 34-year period ... a time frame that to many observers appeared incompatible with the rapid rhythm of change within the framework of globalisation. Before that, as early as 1964, they had reaffirmed the principle of intangibility of the borders inherited from colonisation, and in 1981 they adopted a Charter of human rights and the rights of peoples which took effect a few years later.
The OAU, weakened by political divisions resulting from the cold war and the East-West confrontation, went through the worst crisis in its history in the 1980's. This was sparked by the admission in 1984 of the Sahraoui Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) that divided its members and pushed Morocco to leave the organization. Once this challenge was overcome, the OAU continued to suffer from the weakness of its means of intervention, including military forces for peacekeeping, as it sought to cope with growing numbers of local conflicts.
Calls for prudence
Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, the man who had the ambition of one day seeing a "United States of Africa", a sort of large federation grouping all African countries, finally launched the African Union project. The idea slowly gained ground despite initial reluctance. The Constituent act of the AU was signed by the Heads of State and Government, meeting in Lome, Togo, in 2000, before being solemnly proclaimed at an extraordinary summit in Syrte, Libya. The Constituent Act officially took effect on May 25, 2001 ; the birth of the UA was celebrated at the last OAU summit in Lusaka, Zambia, in July 2001 (1). A transition period of no more than two years was initially envisaged to allow the new institutions to be set up. "We hope that African leaders will not want to go too quickly during this transition period, because if the African Union remains formal and leads to failure, ten to twenty years will have been lost", a European Union observer remarked at the time. He recalled that the OAU represents "a block of 53 members while Europe was made from a group of six countries", with strong political motivations and a constant effort to mobilise public opinion. Other calls for prudence came from Africa itself and even more recently : the Consultative Group for the major orientations for the African Union (AU) which met in early May in Addis Ababa called for prolonging the transition period before setting up the new Pan-African structure. A decision can only be made by the Heads of State at their Durban meeting.
One of the stakes for Africa is precisely mobilising civil society at large, and not just politicians, in favour of the new Union while a high proportion of the population remains victim to poverty, conflicts and scourges such as AIDS. Financing the new Union also remains a matter of concern, since the OAU has never been able to collect the arrears on contributions owed by some of its members. These countries by the end of 2001 owed more than 50 million dollars in arrears, or more than the budget adopted for the transition from the OAU to the AU.
(1) The principles of the AU are based on the equality, sovereignty and interdependence of states as well as on non-interference and the prohibition of the use of force as well as the condemnation of anti-constitutional regimes.
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