Pan-Africanism -
A new hope for Africa?

Although Africa is a continent where there are many bitter wars and armed conflicts, the idea of Pan-Africanism (a united Africa) has been growing stronger in recent years.

The Organization of African Unity

The Organization of African Unity was started in 1963, but it never became a truly effective body. During the 1970s and 1980s the idea of Pan-Africanism seemed to fade away and nationalism grew stronger. There were many African leaders who were dictators with a strong desire for wealth and power, but little concern for human rights and the people they ruled.

PAN-: all (PAN- is used a prefix, that is something that goes at the beginning of a word).

-ISM: an idea, a theory or a viewpoint [-ISM is used as a suffix, that is something that goes at the end of a word]

PAN-AFRICANISM: the view that all of Africa should be political united

NATIONALISM: the idea that nations are the most important political grouping

New Moves towards African Unity

In 1991, at the Organization of African Unity Summit in Nigeria, a treaty was signed establishing an African Economic Community, and proposing an Africa-wide monetary union and a parliament for the African continent by 2025. However, this agenda was clearly too slow.

In 1999 an extraordinary OAU summit was held in Sirte, Libya, and everything was speeded up. The Sirte Declaration decided to establish an African Union,

"to ensure the speedy establishment of ... the African Central Bank, the African Court of Justice and, in particular, the African Parliament. We aim to establish that Parliament by the year 2000."

Although that deadline will not be met, the "Draft Constitutive Act of the African Union" was adopted in July 2000, at the 36th Summit of the Organization of African Unity in Lome, Togo. As a spokesperson for the OAU explained, all African countries have now accepted the notion of an African Union. What remains is to discuss the ways in which this can actually be put into practice.

UNITY: the situation in which people work together for a common purpose

MONETARY: related to money and economics

AGENDA: a list or schedule of things to be done

DRAFT: a piece of writing that is not in its final, finished form, but is still being changed

CONSTITUTIVE: for the purpose of beginning something

SPOKESPERSON: a person who speaks officially for a group

Why has this movement happened now?

After many years of colonial rule, most African countries became independent about forty years ago. However, independence did not bring prosperity and international influence to African countries; instead they continued to be exploited by the developed world and, in many cases, by their own leaders. Now, Africa is a continent in crisis.

Economy

Africa has suffered greatly through the "structural adjustment" (*pop-up window) policies of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. African countries were forced to make very large cuts in spending on things like health care and education in order to try to pay off their huge international debts.

This continues to cause great suffering for the ordinary people of Africa, but it hasn't solved the economic problems. The income per head for all of Africa is $665, which is lower than it was in 1980. Every other region of the world has shown improvement, especially in the developed world. For example, in 1980, the average Westerner earned 15 times more than the average African: now the average Westerner earns 50 times more.

COLONIAL RULE: the period when Africa was controlled by European countries. Most of parts of Africa were colonies.

PROSPERITY: economically successful

TO BE EXPLOITED: to be used unfairly

INCOME PER HEAD: the average amount of money that someone receives in a year

Health

Here, too, Africa is moving backwards, while the rest of the world is generally moving forwards.

Throughout the world, life expectancy has been increasing overall; however,in sub-Saharan Africa life expectancy is now becoming shorter again.

• In 1960 it was 40 years In 1990 it was 52 years Now it is 48 years, the same as it was in 1980.
• A person who lives in sub-Saharan Africa can now expect to live for 14 years less than a person who lives in South Asia, the next-poorest region of the World.
• Someone in the rich world can expect to live for 30 longer than someone from sub-Saharan Africa.
• Life-expectancy in the countries worst hit by AIDS, like Uganda and Zimbabwe, has fallen below the figures for 1960.

Globalization

The crisis in Africa has become so serious that African governments feel they must take action. They cannot allow the situation to continue. And one of the most important reasons that African countries feeling the need to act together is the rush towards globalization that has taken place during the last ten years.

Growing numbers of Africans realise that individual African countries cannot stand alone against the power of the transnational corporations from the rich world. They need to come together if they want to defend the interests of Africans successfully. An African trading block would have much more bargaining power than even the biggest African country on its own.

In political terms, too, unity offers Africa a better chance. It is very unlikely that any individual African country will ever have a permanent seat on the UN Security Council (if it is reformed). However, it would be more difficult to refuse a seat to an African Union that represented 10% of the world's population.

TRANSNATIONAL CORPORATIONS: corporations that have business in many different countries

TRADING BLOCK: a group of countries that co-operate closely in trade.

PERMANENT SEAT on the UN SECURITY COUNCIL: The UN Security Council makes many of the important UN decisions. The United States, Russia, China, France and the United Kingdon have Permanent seats on the Security Council. Other countries have seats on the Council for a limited period of time.