African leaders and their people must map out the next 50 years of political and economic integration, with emphasis on achieving shared economic prosperity throughout the continent and the African Diaspora. On this momentous occasion it is imperative to reflect on the achievements, failures and future prospects of continental integration.
The mission of the OAU consisted of two key objectives: the Total Liberation of Africa and the achievement of African Unity. These two can then be broken down further as follows: To achieve equality, justice and dignity for all citizens, and ensure their advancement; To establish unity that transcends ethnic or national lines; To establish and maintain peace and stability, and settle disputes through mediation and negotiation; Freedom, including fighting against all forms of neocolonialism; Noninterference in the internal affairs of other African states, with a specific prohibition on cross-border subversive activities; and Nonalignment with any major power blocs.
The AU framework has been designed as to do the following; institutionalize continental integration, ensure continuity of OAU ideals, further the objectives of AEC, strengthen regional blocks (EAC, SADC, COMESA, ECOWAS, Magreb), and operationalize the AU strategic arms, that is, New Economic Partnership for Economic Development (Nepad), African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), and the African Parliament. Some of the objectives of this successor organization, the AU, include; To achieve greater unity and solidarity between the African countries and the people of Africa; To defend the sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence of its Member States; To accelerate the political and socio-economic integration of the continent; To promote and defend African common positions on issues of interest to the continent and its peoples.
Background
They say a page of history is worth ten volumes of logic, so let us start with some background. The OAU was rooted in the philosophy of Pan Africanism. Pan Africanist conferences were held from 1900 to 1945 attended by various political leaders & intellectuals from Europe, North America, Caribbean and Africa. They met six times to discuss colonial control of the continent and African political liberation. The six congresses: the first one in 1900 organized by Sylvester Williams, where the father of Pan-Africanism, WEB DuBois was present. Next was 1919 (Paris); then the third and fourth was in 1921 & 1923 in London. The fifth was in 1927 in New York, and the last key one was after the Second World War, thereafter leading into the liberation struggles in Africa, in Manchester in 1945.
What is the meaning of Pan-Africanism? As an organizing framework and philosophy it means all people of African descent, living in or outside the continent, are the same people, and must unite and work together for their political, social and economic advancement. Africans are not only found on the continent. They are in North America, South America, the Caribbean islands and all over the world. The founding fathers and mothers of Pan-Africanism include WEB Du Bois, Kwame Nkrumah, George Padmore, Martin Delany, Marcus Garvey, Jomo Kenyatta, Patrice Lumumba, Haile Selassie, Sékou Touré, Abdul Nasser, Sojourner Truth, Harriet Tubman, Mbuya Nehanda, Ben Bella, Cheikh Anta Diop, Léopold Senghor, Julius Nyerere, Walter Rodney, Franz Fanon, and Amilcar Cabral. Many other distinguished revolutionaries followed in this great Pan-Africanist tradition and these include Samora Machel, Kenneth Kaunda, Robert Mugabe, Nelson Mandela, Joshua Nkomo, Herbert Chitepo, Thabo Mbeki, and Muammar Gaddafi, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jnr, Winnie Mandela, Angela Davis, Ruth First, and Sheiba Tavarwisa.
As conceived then, Pan Africanism is about the total liberation and unification of the African continent and its peoples. Until the entire African continent is free, no person of African descent anywhere in the world will be free or respected. That was the spirit. Africa is the richest continent, with more 30 million km² of land most of it which is arable. It is endowed with large quantities of underground natural resources, forests, animals, water bodies, and extensive coastlines. All this wealth belongs to Africans and the African Diaspora. It must be leveraged to empower them.
In the Pan-African world outlook there is an emphasis on acknowledging and leveraging African contributions to knowledge, such as Ubuntu with its various and variegated slogans: I am because we are. We are because I am. I am because you are. Also there is a strong embrace of African contributions to civilization such as Egyptology, the Pyramids, the Great Zimbabwe, and Mali’s Timbuktu. The old civilizations of Mali, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, and Egypt are embraced while noting that some of the currently dominant nations are very young, for example the USA is only 237 years old, which is a baby in terms of civilization. African contributions to thought leadership include civilization universal, African philosophy, religions, and regional integration concepts, are preached. This is the African renaissance. However, it must be emphasized that this notion of renaissance must include economic and military affairs so that we are able to defend and enhance the African civilizations. Slavery and colonialism distorted the trajectory of the continent hence the African renaissance must concentrate on remaking the narrative of our people. However, all this will require African political, social and economic unity.
The achievements of the OAU and AU
After a decade of the African Union, and as we celebrate 50 years since the founding of the OAU, it is an opportune moment for reflection on the historic achievements and the grand narratives that have been part of the Pan African project for at least the last fifty years. We have had our fair share of achievements and challenges. The major successes have been in the area of liberation and political freedom. From the independence of Ghana in 1957, through that of Nigeria and Kenya, right up to Zimbabwe’s in 1980 the freedom train was unstoppable. Following Namibian independence and the end of apartheid in 1994, the transformation of the OAU into the African Union signaled a new era for our continent. Led by the OAU during the Cold War, the African Group at the United Nations (UN) was a disciplined and formidable voting bloc. With great ingenuity and resolve, it oversaw the imposition of sanctions against both Rhodesia and apartheid South Africa — the first use of such measures in the world body’s history.
The OAU’s primary mandate was to liberate Africa from the shackles of colonialism and apartheid. That was effectively achieved. Except for the case of Western Sahara, the rest of African continent is free from foreign domination. This background of liberation is what heralded in the current positive trends we see in Africa today. Currently the African narrative has not been all gloom. Seven out of ten of the fastest growing economies in the World for the period 2011-15 are African. These are Ethiopia, Mozambique, Tanzania, Congo, Ghana, Zambia, and Nigeria. In the period 2001-10 there were six African countries in the top ten; Angola, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Chad, Mozambique, and Rwanda. These countries are experiencing what has been called China or Asia type growth rates of around 10%. Africa is the second fastest growth region after Asia, and it is projected to overtake Asia within a year’s time. Africa’s middle class is poised to be greater than that of China in ten years’ time. All these new statistics about the continent point to new economic growth and improved country competitiveness leading to new business opportunities. It also presents scope to uplift African communities out of poverty. The regional blocs of SADC, COMESA, EAC, ECOWAs and Magreb have performed reasonably well in particular with respect to maintaining peace, and political stability.
The challenges and why they persist
In terms of challenges we have a number of civil wars, coup d’états, food insecurity, weak nation states, unstable governments, lack of economic prosperity, and weak economic integration. For example, citizens in countries like Somalia, Sudan, Congo, CAR, Mali and Chad still suffer from warfare and poverty. There is fragmentation, destruction and structural underdevelopment caused by centuries of colonialism. There is balkanization and divisions along colonial lines; Francophone vs. Anglophone vs. Lusophone vs. Arabic. All this has complicated the tasks of nation and state formation, fighting poverty, ignorance and disease. The vision of African unity, development and integration has thus been difficult to realize. The recent impressive growth story has not translated into economic diversification, commensurate jobs or faster social development. Most African economies still depend heavily on commodity production and exports, with too little value addition and few forward and backward linkages to other sectors of the economy.
The reasons why these 50 years have had a number of failures include: Individual country vertical integration into the rich North; Unequal and Uneven Development, the African “Nation-state” is still in the making, some countries are neither nation state nor nations, most are just neo-colonial states; while African remains balkanized. Clearly we are still facing challenges on the road to continental integration.
A major challenge of African economies is the absence of basic economic statistics. Planning, execution and monitoring is difficult without data. For example, GDP assumes the necessary information to calculate accurate estimates exists, and that it is available consistently over time. Of course, there is always some information missing. We have no proven methods of measuring poverty, and in most African countries there is no reliable data basic economic data such as population statistics. There must be capacity building and resourcing of our measuring and data collection platforms
In 1963 as they were setting up the organization of OAU, this is what Kwame Nkrumah had to say “The independence of Ghana is meaningless unless it is linked to the independence of the rest of Africa.” He went further and asserted that “We as Ghanaians are prepared to surrender our sovereignty in part or in total in pursuit of African Unity.” Ben Bella the great Algerian leader has this to say, “Let us die a little so that Rhodesia can be free. Let us die a little so that South Africa can be free.” Today, how many African leaders can speak like these great Pan-Africanists?
This is what the Nkrumah of today would say, “The prosperity of South Africa is meaningless unless it is linked to the prosperity of the rest of the continent.” He would further intimate that, “We as Ghanaians are prepared to surrender our sovereignty in part or in total in pursuit of complete African economic integration.” Of course the 21st Century Ben Bella would say, “Let us all die a little so that there is shared economic prosperity throughout the African continent. Let us die a little so that the African Diaspora can be economically empowered.” Are the current African leaders prepared to step up to the plate and build on the legacy of Kwame Nkrumah and Ben Bella? The evidence has been disappointing.
21st Century Pan-Africanism is about shared economic prosperity and unification of the African continent and peoples. Now we are pushing for Pan-Africanism rooted in economics, entrepreneurship, science and technology, the ICT revolution, creativity, innovation and talent. Until the entire African Continent is prosperous, no person of African descent anywhere in the world will be respected. This dictum must apply to all Africans, in particular those with high public visibility like Barrack Obama, Oprah Winfrey, Aliko Dangote, Patrice Motsepe, Mo Ibrahim, Jacob Zuma and Goodluck Jonathan. They are not worthy of respect or honour until all people of African descent are prosperous. Their success and significance; their positions of power or wealth, should be meaningless unless it is linked to the prosperity of the entire African continent and its diaspora. That is the spirit of Kwame Nkrumah and Ben Bella. That’s the philosophy we must embrace as we celebrate 50 years of the AU and OAU.
On the Pan-Africanist agenda there is a leadership vacuum. Most of those constituting the current crop of African leaders are inward looking, and national interest driven. They do not understand that regional and continental integration is not free. There are painful trade-offs to be made. You have to give up some aspects of national sovereignty in order to effectively embrace operationalize the regional blocks such as SADC, EAC, COMESA, and ECOWAS. More importantly, you have to give up some aspects of national sovereignty in order to deliver effective and complete economic integration of the African continent, through the AU. We need to move away the traditional emphasis on the nation state and its trappings and embrace collective continental sovereignty. We must be able to say “I am an African first and Zimbabwean second.” African countries have to restructure their economies away from overdependence on custom revenues. New revenue streams have to be developed from intra-Africa trade and other aspects of complementarity.
The big debates at the beginning of the OAU are still unresolved. Nkrumah pushed for an immediate establishment of a United States of Africa while Nyerere pushed for a gradual process of building African Unity brick by brick through regional blocs that will then combine into an integrated African continent. Neither of the two approaches has been pursued in earnest, much less succeed. Africans must wake up. There is dearth of decisive Pan-Africanist leadership. As we celebrate these 50 years let us rededicate ourselves to the agenda of making the 21st Century, the African Century. Come 2063 we must have a United States of Africa, by whatever approach or strategy we adopt.
AU must give hope that the 21st Century is indeed an African Century. All this must be within the philosophy of African Renaissance where we push regeneration of African culture, economy and democracy, while repositioning Africa in global geo-politics. The doctrine of African solutions for African problems must be reinforced. However, this is not possible if 58% of the AU budget is paid by the so-called co-operating partners external to Africa, in particular coming in from Europe and the USA. In fact these foreign partners will insidiously influence the African agenda and encourage certain AU programs while undermining others. More specifically, they will neither encourage nor support the key African strategic initiatives that require continental consensus such as ownership of African natural resources by Africans, change in natural resource laws, beneficiation of African primary products, and smart protectionism of new African value addition industries. The African status quo benefits the partners’ countries. It is not in the interest of the rich North, Western or Eastern economic powers to promote beneficiation in Africa. Their preference is for Africa to produce and sell raw materials while they sell refined goods to Africa. If beneficiation is to happen on the continent, it will happen in spite of these rich nations. Africa is on its own with respect to the value addition agenda. In fact, the economically strong will disincentivize Africa from value addition. Moreover, it is not in the interest of Europe, the USA, India or China to have a strong globally competitive and fully integrated economy of united and focused 1.1 billion Africans with a collective GDP of USD 2.5 trillion. Given these competitive issues with respect to the so called international partners, how can the AU allow 58% of its budget to be driven by opponents of its agenda? How can African leaders be that blind, deaf and dumb? As we celebrate this Jubilee, Africans must wake up and smell the coffee. The complete economic integration of Africa leading to a peaceful, stable, prosperous, and democratic continent should be funded by Africans themselves.
Recent activities demonstrated some of the weaknesses of our African institutions. The crass and clumsy behavior of member states in the election of the AU Commission Chair pitting Dlamini Zuma and Jean Ping was not helpful. This was worsened by the brazen involvement of external powers, in particular France. The NATO action in Libya with the complicity of Nigeria, Gabon and SA, against the AU and general African position, was unfortunate. The involvement of France in Côte d'Ivoire in the dispute between Gbagbo and Ouattara completely undermined the AU. The same can be said of the recent French activities in Mali. Are the Africans and the AU this impotent? Furthermore, there are too many bilateral deals between individual African countries and European, American and Asian nations; undermining African unity and cohesion. Under globalization the small nation state is not the best platform of survival. Our regional blocks; EAC, COMESA, SADC, Magreb, ECOWAS are better frameworks to these non-African economies. Scale, market size, pooling of resources together and regional consensus improve bargaining power immensely.
The way forward and the prospects
As we look at the next 50 years, there are new prospects for more effective integration. Globalization has created a new imperative for African unity. It is now a survival issue. Under globalization, regional and continental integration is the only viable framework. Regional blocs are now global best practice as evidenced by the efforts of the EU, NAFTA, and ASEAN. Advances in science and technology, in particular the ICT revolution have provided effective tools for integration. Fundamental and extensive technology driven innovations have taken place. The ubiquity of ICTs and mobile phones in particular has revolutionized communication in Africa. It is estimated that there are 600 million handsets on the continent.
The Chinese success story is also inspiring for Africa. They were once as poor as us, but in a just generation from 1978 to 2008, they were able to become the second biggest economy in the world, moving over 300 million people out of poverty. More significantly for Africa they did by leveraging their disciplined and focused population size, 1.3 billion people. An integrated African economy of 1.1 billion hard working and well skilled Africans has to be our answer. The total gross domestic product of all the SADC countries, including South Africa, is less than that of Turkey, Denmark, or Brazil. If the entire region cannot compete with a single country what could be expected of the constituent members? African states will be forced to unite to achieve the economies of scale necessary to compete in the global economy. A globalizing world has made the imperative for integration unequivocal. In unity lies scale and strength. If anything should get the continent's nations to work together, it is the prospect of shared prosperity.
Continental integration is more important now, because under globalization the key drivers are regional attractiveness, regional competitiveness, continental attractiveness, and continental competitiveness. Regional and continental frameworks are the only game in town. National economic plans, budgets, visions, strategies and programs must be aligned between the African countries and fashioned into regional ones and ultimately into continental frameworks initiatives. For example we need SADC and COMESA economic visions and strategies. More importantly, we need the AU 50 year Economic Vision (Africa 2063) and the corresponding AU Economic Strategy. Infrastructure and financing models for integration must be developed, such as the regional infrastructure projects, AfDB Pan-African Infrastructure Bond, and the Programme for Infrastructure Development in Africa (PIDA) projects.
The world is also now confronted by global problems requiring global solutions, and this presents an atmosphere that nudges Africans into seeking Africa wide solution. New South-South groupings such as the BRICS are also fortuitous as they incentivize African countries to work on building scale. South Africa will only be a meaningful member of the BRICS if they are there as part of SADC or the AU. There is also a growing global realization that there is a fortune at the bottom of the pyramid, thus attracting investors and capital to emerging markets, using volume and technology driven strategies and business models. All these recent developments and phenomena bode well for the resurgence of 21st Century Pan-Africanism and continental integration.
There are things, we can do immediately. For example, remove the visa and immigration constraints among our people. We must allow free movement of goods and people across African borders. The single African passport must become a reality. This is within our control as African leaders. Of course the borderless continent will require infrastructure to facilitate movement. The bread and butter of regional integration; interconnected road, train, air space, power and ICT networks should be at the center of our discussion. Regional blocks should be nudged towards common passports, such as those of the Economic Community of West African States, and spending requirements – probably first on agriculture, but later on a range of priorities – will be imposed on individual countries. By 2063, the continent should have moved close to full economic integration, with people and goods flowing over national borders that will exist largely as theoretical lines, rather than imposing fence. This time the driver will be economic necessity in a competitive world.
In order to compete, Africa requires internal trade, investment in the skills and technology that can make it more productive, an end to conflict and a reduction in overall military spending, and united policy-making at a global level. For individual countries, that means giving up at least a portion of their sovereignty. And that is exactly what leaders of the AU hope they will do. There must be movement from pursuit national self-sufficiency to complementarity through intra-Africa trade. Diversification is needed to increase trade numbers. This means a country must produce something that is trade-able, which other countries want. This speaks to the importance of value addition. Each country must understand its comparative and competitive advantages, and then produce the right type of quality and quantity at the right price. Beyond intra-Africa trade we need intra-Africa Investment, and investment outflows from the continent to the rest of the world. Effectively leveraging Africa’s vast natural resource coupled with beneficiation enable all this, and play a significant role in the sustainable development of Africa where there is strong, shared and inclusive economic growth. Furthermore, with a growing population of over a billion people Africa is on track for a demographic dividend, through training, education and re-skilling. Where young people constitute 60% of the African population, the continent is also poised for a youth dividend. These two dividends augment and add to the African value proposition to the world. We need Pan-African strategies to enhance human capital development and programs target the empowerment of young people. After all Africa 2063 is about the future. Today’s young people must lead today, and create their destiny.
Empowerment of African women and equality of the sexes is more than a discourse on human rights. It is not just about morality and righting the wrong of the past. It is all about economics. Women constitute more than 52% of the population. Moreover, new studies find that female managers outshine their male counterparts in almost every measure. Women have special skills, that men are weak in, such as multi-tasking, caring and nurturing, meticulousness and thoroughness, service excellence, quality and aesthetics, sensitivity, high emotional intelligence (EQ), and high cultural intelligence (CQ). Men and women bring different skills and strengths to an organization. There is, therefore, need to leverage and unlock value from the differences between men and women. Throughout Africa, we must view gender diversity is a virtue.
Improvements are being seen and can be enhanced in education, child and maternal mortality rates, and gender equality. The decades-long quest for Africa's political and economic integration must be addressed. Energising and galvanising the people of the continent toward an African Renaissance is the objective. The result will be continent more productive, with faster economic growth, better levels of employment, more skilled people, plentiful food, and perhaps even a universal respect for human rights. And also, economically empowered people have fewer conflicts, finally a continent at peace with itself. The last 50 years there was concentration on political rights and civil rights. Next 50 years must place a premium on economic rights, in other words we are migrating from civil rights to silver rights. The emphasis now on economic empowerment, economic safety nets, wealth creation, ownership of resources, access to finance, job creation, productivity, jobs, food security, education and health.
As we speed up integration of the continent we must improve our understanding the Nature of Africa’s Investment Opportunities. According to a McKinsey report of 2010 the following was posited; $2.6 trillion – Africa’s collective GDP in 2020 (of which $1.3 trillion is from consumer facing industries), $1.4 trillion – Africa’s consumer spending in 2020; 1.1 billion – the number of Africans of working age in 2040, 128 million – the number of African households with discretionary income in 2020; 50% – the portion of Africans living in cities by 2030. The summary impact from this research is that Africa’s growth opportunity is more than a resource boom. The key growth driver, about 50% of GDP, is now coming from consumer facing industries (retail, ICT, banking, services). Mining and agriculture are important, but even in these traditional sectors, emphasis is on the potential impact of secondary industries driven by processing and value addition. Africa must move up the regional and global value chains.
Of particular importance is the need to integrate the African Diaspora in our all plans and activity. In fact this group of Africans must be recognized as the 6th African region. On their part, the Africa Diaspora must learn from other countries such India, China and Israel that they can be effective sources of remittances; trade, tourism and investment advocacy; knowledge, ideas and frameworks about statecraft and economic strategies. However there should be no taxation without representation! We as African governments must adequately address the concerns of the African Diaspora such as multiple citizenship and travel documents.
Conclusion
Indeed, the 50th anniversary of the OAU and AU represents yet another moment for reflection and an opportunity to recast of our continent. There is general acceptance about the rise of Africa for the last decade in terms of economic growth, public investment in infrastructure development, regional integration efforts, as well as improvements in democracy, governance, peace and stability and some human development indicators. There is also an emerging consensus that Africa’s endowments and future trends present huge opportunities: its human resources and demographic trends, especially its youthful population and its women; its rates of urbanization; the arable land and other natural resources at its disposal; the potential for energy generation, both fossil and renewables; its mineral deposits and its long coastlines. All this potential must be converted into economic value.
We must ensure that Africa is integrated, people-centred, prosperous and at peace with itself over the next five decades. We must set bold milestones in various continental frameworks and initiatives, especially around human development, infrastructure, agriculture, women’s empowerment, health and industrialization, and above all on political unity and integration.
We must grow the requisite leadership, facilitate people’s participation, boost resource mobilization and improve our implementation, monitoring and evaluation strategies in order to ensure impact, scale, efficiency and effectiveness. We must ensure that our institutional architectures and value systems are aligned towards the achievement of rapid integration, development and industrialization. However, we must take a hard look at our failures. Only through robust self-criticism and introspection can appropriate lessons of history be learnt and Africans, as a people, self-correct, rededicate and confidently forge ahead towards a peaceful, stable, fully integrated continent characterized by shared economic prosperity. Africans have largely misunderstood Nkrumah’s clarion call, “Seek ye first the political kingdom and all else shall de added unto it.” He did not mean a national political kingdom for each African country. He meant a borderless united and politically integrated African continent. We have not achieved this. Consequently, the socio-economic kingdom has remained an illusion. Africa must unite.
Peace and stability are not achievable without economic development. Furthermore, development is people. Every generation defines its mission, and fulfills it or betrays it. On the 25th of May 1963 Nkrumah’s generation clearly defined their agenda, they fought and they conquered. On this 25th of May 2013, 50 years later, let us have clarity and conviction about our Pan-African generational mandate: Achieving sustainable, shared and inclusive economic prosperity for all people of Africa descent, through the complete social, political and economic integration of the African continent including its Diaspora. Yes, we shall triumph and overcome. However, where there is no struggle there is no progress.
Aluta Continua
Arthur G.O. Mutambara
Deputy Prime Minister, Republic of Zimbabwe
Post published in: News