Pan-Africanism needs more Mbekis
Mbeki was being honoured for his exemplary leadership and unshaken commitment in the task allocated to him by the African Union in respect of the crisis in the Sudan, which led to the peaceful emergence of South Sudan, and subsequently succeeded in averting war between these two African nations .The award itself is proof, if […]
Mbeki was being honoured for his exemplary leadership and unshaken commitment in the task allocated to him by the African Union in respect of the crisis in the Sudan, which led to the peaceful emergence of South Sudan, and subsequently succeeded in averting war between these two African nations .The award itself is proof, if any is needed, that “there is life after State House” as Professor Abdoulaye Bathily, chairman of the Award Selection Committee, so succinctly puts it. For, indeed, after a life time of work for the African National Congress, for South Africa and indeed the entire continent, first as a freedom fighter and subsequently as Mandela’s successor Mbeki remains a worth son of Africa and deserves all the awards we can heap on him.
Mbeki’s visions remind us of great crusaders of African Unity like Kwame Nkrumah, Gamal Abdel Nasser and Julius Nyerere. His record, while in office, made all Africa proud, even Zuma. That he continues with his political zeal, intellectual commitment and sheer hard work even after leaving office attests to his progressive Pan-Africanist credentials. The current dearth of people like him must be what led Kingibe to rightly conclude (or perhaps fear) that he may be “the last Pan-Africanist standing.”
However, the pragmatic Baba Kingibe betrays his romantic, nay revolutionary side by this subtle lamentation. The reluctant optimist that he is, Kingibe would wish that there are more Mbekis around. There is no denying the fact that the African situation is dire. A united, all-African approach is clearly still needed if we are to emerge from the mess we are in. In the eternal words of Nkrumah; “If we are to remain free, if we are to enjoy the full benefits if Africa’s rich heritage, we must unite to plan our total defence and full exploration of our material and human means in the full interest of our people. To do it alone will limit our horizon, curtail our expectations and threaten our liberty.”
Fledgling as it was, our unity under the OAU helped in getting rid of colonial rule (except in the Saharawi Republic) and white supremacy. The African Union has also tried. Besides the Sudan and South Sudan we have been successful in handling crises in Sierra Leone, Liberia and elsewhere. Somalia and DR Congo still remain to be solved, and the approach to Mali remains problematic, but as Mbeki rightly said in his acceptance speech, with what was achieved in the Sudan, “we have demonstrated that it is possible for us to solve our problems.” We need to see more of such Pan-Africanism and Pan-Africanists at work.
As we reflect on these five last five decades of our attempt to forge a united stand based on a shared identity, several problems linger, begging for resolutions. The major one is that of our lot as “The Wretched of the Earth” as Fanon puts it. Of the 25 least developed nations on Earth, 24 are members of the African Union. Our continent has the largest number of nations with the most abysmal development indices in respect of illiteracy, school enrolments, poverty, child/infant and maternal mortality, to jobs and low wages.
In his Address to the ANC in 1953, ten years before the formation of the OAU, Nelson Mandela described the lot of the ordinary Africans in these words:
“… the living conditions of the people, already extremely difficult, are steadily worsening and becoming unbearable. The purchasing power of the masses is progressively declining and the cost of living skyrocketing. Bread is now dearer than it was two months ago. The cost of milk, meat and vegetables is beyond the pockets of the average family and many of our people cannot afford them. The people are too poor to have enough food to feed their families and children. They cannot afford sufficient clothing, housing and medical care. They are denied the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, old age and where these exist, they are of an extremely inferior and useless nature. Because of lack of proper medical amenities, our people are ravaged by such dreaded diseases as tuberculosis, venereal disease, leprosy …and infant mortality is very high.”
He was referring to South Africa under Apartheid but could have been describing any part of today’s Africa. Have these conditions really improved? Everywhere you go you hear the same cry for jobs, housing, service delivery (especially education and health), water, electricity, basic infrastructure and security. We need to go back to the drawing table and devise new plans beyond the Lagos Plan of Action, the Lome Conventions and the NEPAD. The African Union would have to do much better to get the people of the Continent out of the woods.
At the political level we would have to come to terms with, and learn to manage our differences. Otherwise Mali, for example, would revert to anarchy and hopelessness because nobody seems to accept that the problems in its northern territories, especially the need to include the Touregs and other minorities, would have to be faced squarely. Additionally, while sensitive to the imperative to resist outside meddling, still we need to make it clear that impunity, especially with regards to genocide and ethnic cleansing, would not be condoned.
Finally, the whole issue of African Unity has remained, as one commentator puts it, a matter of “we the heads of states and governments” and it is high time it is owned by “we the people”. Without taking ownership of the whole process and program this dream would remain a matter of governmental meetings, little-known and generally ignored protocols promoted in seminars, conferences and official communiqués.
Looking ahead to the next fifty years, it is still possible to imagine the hoped-for African Millennium. Mbeki and a few others give us hope. We may have had “our feet fast welded to the starting block” for so long, Kongi. Yet, even in this “hour of the locusts” our generation will yet “learn to spell hope”.