Maputo, Mozambique — The Mozambican Parliament Wednesday passed a bill to ratify the Constitutive Act of the African Union.

The lukewarm debate on the ratification bill featured mostly deputies from the ruling Frelimo party asserting that Africa needs "a strong union to defend its dignity and identity."

Members of the Renamo-led opposition coalition complained that the matter should have been put to a referendum.

Renamo chief whip David Alone even dismissed the idea of an African Union as "a utopia of African leaders."

Alone questioned the feasibility of an African Union without first consolidating sub regional integration through bodies like the Southern African Development Community (SADC).

Alone poured scorn on plans to create an African parliament, an African Central Bank and an African Monetary Fund. Dreams of such institutions, he said, were just "a hasty imitation, without any solid basis, of the European Union."

He said he did not think that documents such as the Sirte Declaration would allow the continent "to overcome poverty, hunger, illiteracy and disease."

Foreign Minister Leonardo Simao did not reply to any of these criticisms, nor did Alone press his position into a vote.