Durban, South Africa — The outgoing interim secretary-general of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), the Ivorian Amara Essy, was returned - again in an interim capacity - as the new head of the African Union (AU) at its recent inaugural summit in Durban, South Africa. Essy, a former foreign minister of Cote dIvoire, was in charge of the OAU from September 2001, during a transitional year until the launch of the AU on 9 July.
Essy stays on for a further year as chairperson of the interim AU Commission until the next scheduled ordinary summit of the African Union in Mozambique in July 2003. But will his term then be extended? It is in Maputo that a new chairperson of the Commission (the equivalent of the OAU secretary-general) will be known and the outgoing OAU assistant secretaries-general (newly named 'acting commissioners') will be replaced by a deputy chair and 10 commissioners from all regions of the continent.
There was some debate in Durban about how long the interim AU Commission chairperson should hold office, with suggestions ranging from six to twelve months. So does this mean that there was not unanimous endorsement of Amara Essy? That was the first question put to him by allAfrica.com's Ofeibea Quist-Arcton in a joint interview with Gamal Gorkeh Nkrumah, international affairs editor of the Cairo-based weekly Al-Ahram newspaper.
There seemed to be some confusion among heads of state at the African Union summit in Durban about how long you will be the interim chairman of the new AU secretariat, known as the Commission. Am I right?
I think that some of them said six months, some said one year, but the majority decided on one year. To elect the commissioners takes a lot of work. You need to know the financial costs, that is very important. We will be changing from one secretary-general and five assistant secretaries-general to ten commissioners. How will you finance this? You have to know all this before.
Why the need for an extraordinary summit in six months, when you are staying on for a year and Maputo has already been chosen as the location for the next ordinary scheduled AU summit in a year? I believe Libya has proposed some complicated amendments that need discussing.
That is another thing. You know, they have some draft amendments in the Constitutive Act of the African Union. We will send the draft to all the AU members and it will be studied by the Executive Council and the decision will be taken by the extraordinary summit.
Mr Essy, do you feel you have the full support of all the AU heads of state? Because we were told that some seemed to want another chairman to head the Commission of the AU and the name of the former president of Mali, Alpha Oumar Konare, repeatedly cropped up. Was he here in Durban?
I am not concerned by this. Whether that was true or not true, I dont know.
You must have heard the rumours, you must have heard the whispers
You know, at the OAU, there are rumours all the time. So really I am not concerned by this. Everyone can be a candidate, I respect him. If he is a candidate we will see.
After your transitional year as chairperson of the Commission of the African Union, do you think you will succeed in securing another term? Would you want it? What is the job like?
Really, I dont think about it. What I want to do now is all the work Ive been given. It will be up to the heads of state to make their decisions.
But do you like the job?
Like? I am committed to Africa. That is all I can say for now. What I did in nine months as the interim secretary-general of the OAU was a tremendous job. I was elected for one year, but I started three months later. So I did all this work in nine months. We worked very hard to implement all the decisions taken at the AU summit in Durban and to work on the structure of the Commission. We will also have to make all the rules and regulations for the next African Union summit. That is my goal today and I think that we can make it.
I came into this job not because Im looking for a new position. I thank God because, in my career as a diplomat, I achieved anything you can dream of as a diplomat. So really I am not doing this for any reason other than to help Africa and to put before the service of the AU all the experience I have drawn from my multiple careers.
But do you feel you have the backing of all the African leaders in the African Union behind you?
You know nobody, not even God, can be accepted unanimously. I know that some say that we have to make the interim period as short as possible. And its true, when you are a transitional chairman, you cannot take a lot of decisions because you have to sack many people. That is normal, because many things are not going well within the OAU.
And you cannot bring to the African Union all the problems you found in the OAU. One of the bad things today is that the assistant secretaries-general, the new commissioners, will be elected. So they will have political support. If they dont do their jobs well, you cannot move them, because they were elected. That is the big difference between the African Union and the European Union and with Mercosur in Latin America and also Asean, the Association of South East Asian Nations. [In those organisations] nobody is elected, only the chairman is elected; after that, they have consultations to form the cabinet. So, if some things dont work, then you can move.
But in the African Union you cant move. And that was one of the big problems that faced the OAU. There was always a struggle between the secretary-general and his assistants, because they were all elected.
Everybody thinks that they have political support, so they have to do what they want sometimes.
Will regions be taken into consideration in the selection of commissioners and will this be linked to funding?
I think that there will be two commissioners per region. They have said they will select their commissioners before they go through the full selection process.
Do you have any idea how you will be financing this new secretariat, the AU Commission?
You know, I put into place a commission to mobilise resources. They will start working soon, so that we can find out how we will finance this. Because, as you know, we will be changing from four organs to 17 institutions. So you need to finance all this and you cant finance it on the regular budget.
Any idea how you are going to raise the money?
We have many ideas, maybe to collect taxes on plane tickets and to fund raise and to organise concerts. Also I spoke to business people here. The Association of African Businessmen was here. I met them and said, okay, if tomorrow we are successful, you will benefit, so you have to do something [to help cover] the cost of the African Union. I told them that, if tomorrow we have a big market, they can export and make money, so they have to think how they can help to finance the Union.
What about the secretariat of the OAU? Does the staff complement currently stand at 400 and will it become the personnel of the new AU Commission?
Before they had 600. But they had restructuring within the OAU secretariat and 100 people left. But there are still a lot of people.
We have been told that all the staff from the OAU secretariat are going to have to re-apply for their jobs if they want to join the AU?
You see, its not an easy job. That is why I want to have some time to clean the ground before the election of the commissioners. They had a lot of problems within the OAU, which is normal after 39 years. Many people seem to have joined the organisation without consideration of competence.
You know, when they made a study three years ago, many people had to go. Some took redundancy packages, but they were still in the OAU. When we froze recruitment, they were still within the organisation.
The problem is that they have a rule, when moving from the old organisation to the new, that you have to make a kind of evaluation. They will assess who has the relevant competence to move directly to the new organisation. They will identify those who need training for 2-3 months or one year. They will be selected to go for training. Those who cannot move to the new organisation will have to be paid some money. And there are rules within the ILO (International Labour Organisation) . I think you are entitled to 18 months salary and other compensation. So you have to find money to pay all this. So, this has not been resolved yet.
Those from the OAU secretariat who will be moving to the African Union, do they have to re-apply for their jobs or, if their performance is considered okay, do they make the transfer automatically?
You know, one of the studies we made was of the job descriptions within the African Union. Those who have the relevant qualifications and competence can move.
Without having to re-apply?
Even if they re-apply, we know that they will go directly, because they have all the qualifications to move. They have rights. You have to give them priority before you recruit new people, if they have the competence. We will have a private company check all this.
When we have the job descriptions, they will make all these studies and those who have the necessary qualifications can move directly, even if they have to make an application for form.
There was some talk of moving the headquarters of the African Union from Addis Ababa somewhere else. Is there any truth in this?
That was a long time ago. In the Constitutive Act (of the AU), it says that the headquarters stays in Addis Ababa.
What happens next is that we will have 17 institutions, so they can put these all over Africa. There will be a central bank. I received an application from Kenya to be home to the Investment Bank. Togo also made an application to house the Investment Bank.
South Africa, Namibia and Botswana have made an application for some institutions. So the institutions will be spread all over the continent.
What about the site for the new African parliament? Has Libya applied?
Not yet. Not yet.
'Peer review was very much the buzz phrase in Durban, the fact that leaders will now be open to being monitored and possibly criticised and sanctioned. Yet troubled Zimbabwe hardly got a mention while Madagascars seat was left empty, because the heads of state did not consider Marc Ravalomanana a 'constitutionally elected leader. Where do you draw the line about which governments are or are not constitutional? People are now looking at the African Union and saying, 'well it stood firm on Madagascar, but surely there are all sorts of semi-constitutional or non constitutional leaders that nothing was said about?', for example Zimbabwe, where the presidential election results were disputed.
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We sent an OAU observer team which found that the elections were free and fair.
But other observer missions found differently.
That is their view. We are African, we have to take our decisions and we are not following anybody.
So in a country, such as Zimbabwe, where tens of thousands people were unable to cast their ballots, does the OAU truly find that election 'free and fair?
What I can say is that we sent a team of observers. The team was there. And, as secretary-general, I have to follow what my team tells me. We sent a big team there to observe the elections and they came out with the conclusions that it was free and fair.
We know that the situation is not always peaceful, they have problems in Zimbabwe. But, despite this, I would say the report I received was acceptable.
From the outside, what image do you think this somewhat inconsistent position gives of the African Union?
I will tell you one thing, really the question of elections is really the business of Africans. That is why Ive said that we have to put in place a strong, strong, structure for elections. You have to believe in Africans themselves. How do you tell that an election is or is not free and fair? What evidence do you have on the evolution of the Zimbabwe election and was it free and fair?
Thats the question Im asking you!
We sent a team. South Africa sent a team and many election observer teams were there. The conclusion is that they say, yes, we know that they had some destruction, but the conclusion is that the election was widely free and fair, not totally one hundred percent, but it was acceptable. That was the conclusion I received.
What about Morocco, are there any moves to have it rejoin the African Union?
No, no, no. This [Western Sahara Sahrawi Republic/Morocco] question is in the hands of the United Nations. We hope that one day we will find a solution to that conflict, because Morocco is a very important member of the OAU. It was part of the formation of the OAU. Morocco has strong leadership and a strong economy, so they need to be part of any African institution that is set up. I hope that this question can be resolved in the future.
