PART-III
Nobody cares about us and brothers and sisters. If you want to know how weak we are, and we are weak. Look at how we are treated. Last month, there World met in New York, the General Assembly when African heads of states and governments are speaking, the Hall is empty. Nobody bothers because they are saying nothing. And even if they are saying something, it is something that can be not compare when an African head of state and government is speaking. And when the prime minister of little Israel is speaking, they will listen because we are weak and disunited.
So we have a weak continent because the spirit of pan Africanism disappeared. So the question that we can ask, what is the state of pan Africanism as we speak today, the African Union, which is weak, says the right things and does the wrong things nine out of 10 times. And what are the critical areas in which we are weak? We are weak politicaly. Because nobody listens to us.On the third day of March, 1997 MalimuJulius, KA of Tanzania, speaking in Accra, Ghana on the occasion of the 40thanniversary of the independence of Ghana said, the speeches entitled;We unite, or We perish.
And Malimu says, I want to apologize to Kwame Nkrumah. Those of us who believed in gradualism were wrong, Nkrumah was right, but Nkrumah also did not appreciate the level of suspicion that existed amongst the leaders at that time. Our generation, he says, fought for the liberation of Africa. It is the duty of the new generation to carry the, to forward. He says in his plea, he says that I do not believe that the tribe can be the basis of mobilization in Africa. And he said that as I travel along across the world, people do not care about our Tanzanianess or our Ghanianess or our Kenyaness or our Ethiopianess. In their eyes, we are all Africans. And perhaps that is what we should use at the building block in order to talk about African unity. But we are not being naive about that unity. Because some times when we talk about Panafricanism and about African unity, people think we are being too simplistic about it. No, it is not being simplistic and being naive. It is recognizing that as long as we remain the way we are, then Africa in the next 25 will be recolonized.
You know, what is the state of Africa as I speak now, what is the state of your continent as we speak now because of what this unity, because when we had disuited, then it is good for Europe and America. Look at the state of your continent. As I speak conflicts of one kind or another, and name the countries just for you to know how bad it is because that is how it is go to Northern Mozambique. The gas that is there cannot be produced because there is conflict Northern Mozambique, go to Somalia conflict here in your motherland conflict, go to South Sudan conflict, go to Sudan conflict, go to Libya conflict. God is Central African Republic conflict. God is the democratic Republic of Congo conflict. Go to Burkina Faso conflict, go to Mali conflict, go to Chad conflict, got to Niger conflict, go to Cameroon conflict, go to Nigeria conflict, do I go on? That is the state of the continent. So that even when we talk about intercontinental trade, you tell me, can you drive from Addis Ababa to Dakar in Senegal, unless you are there, there for himself, which group will not kidnap or ambush?
That is the state of the continent because we are weak and disunited. I fly from Nairobi Kenya for one and a half hours. I come from the shilling zone. I go into the Birr 33 currencies in Africa, None of which is used to conclude transactions anywhere. I come to Addis Ababa and I show my shelling. They say, what is this? But let me show the dollar. Oh, this is it. Let me show the Euro. This is it. Eighty percent of the transactions in Africa are concluded that outside of the continent in dollars. So you may have the central bank of the federal bank of Ethiopia. You may have the central bank of Kenya. You may have all these 35 currencies in the central banks useless because we are not playing in the real league. We are playing in the small league. That is the state of the continent.
So as you have the honor and privilege of serving in the government of the therapy, and as you think about integration, that is the continent in which you are, are now weak. That is the state in which we are. I watched a woman from Nigeria who had been rescued from the Mediterranean around LA producer. Say, I will not go back to Africa. Even if I die in the Mediterranean, I’ll try again and again, what is it that can make a human being say that I do not want to go back to my home. Because the natural instinct of a human being should be that you want to go home is because we are weak.
Africa in the future
Africa in the future, what is the state of pan Africanism? Africa finds ourself in a very difficult situation. What no fear today, many African leaders have gotten used to the trappings of power. And those who speak about power, right? Power corrupts are absolute power corrupts. Absolutely. I remember in 1997, I think I may be wrong about the year 1,995 I think I was serving as an intern at the Malimu Julius Nerere foundation Dares Salam and had the privilege and honor with him. And he had only one gun and the driver and he stopped at the few traffic lights and only moved when the traffic lights moved and I asked him, Malimu, how did you leave power? He said, oh, when I said I wanted to leave office, there was no shortage of people telling me don’t leave us as orphans.
It is very rare to find those in positions of leadership in Africa today who live willingly, leave office. Power in Africa is now sought by hook and crook and retained by hook and crook because the trappings of power are good. And permit me when I am gone. Even if I irritate you. In fact, it is in my intention is to irritate you so that you reflect upon what I’m going to say. And this is a personal thing. I’ll give you an example. When I was appointed as the director of the anti-corruption commission, I drove in the morning in my car with my driver. In the evening, when I was leaving, there were three cars, mine, what was allocated to me and another one in front and another one behind me and 12 individuals. And I asked, who are these fellows? See, these are your security. I said, I don’t need my security.
I don’t need two cars. I only need one car because this thing you call security is spectacle. And throughout the period that I served that is only one security and one car. And I say this because it is in the nature of power to make you use the things that you don’t need. And once you get used to them, then without them, you feel empty and lonely and you will find them. You’ll be told and many of you will love them. They are good. When doors are open for you, they are good. When you occupy front seat, it is good. When you are dressed excellent, it is good when you eat the best food, it is good. When you have security, it is good, but it can also dehumanize you. It can also monsterise you.
I am asking you today, that part of the problem of Africa is that we found human beings and we monsterised them. In 1,983, Nigerian Chinua Achebewritesa book, which I commend to you, the trouble with Nigeria, which could as well be the trouble with Africa, says the trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a problem of leadership. As we look at Africa today, I hope that this administration, which has now committed itself to the PanAfricanmovement, will think in that direction. And this bring me, brings me to what I think should be contemporary pan Africanism. If you look at the treaty of the east African community, the treaty of the east African community says that they a shall first be a common market, then a common currency and political federation, which ought have happened in the year 2010 east Africa community should have had his first president in 2010.
That is now 2020 years, 10 years later, there is no such thing in ECOWASS, itis nothing to have, in SADC it ought to have been the same. I hope that with your population of 120 million, because Ethiopia is an economic powerhouse, potentially, you know, pan Africanism, the new pan Africanism must have an economic component of it. That is how I understand Africa, Agenda 2063 which says that by the year 2063, Africa will pulled up her people into a middle level economy on seven pillars, economically, politically, and otherwise. And the Africa continental free trade area suggested to me that we’ll have broken all the tariff and tariff barriers.
Will we be able to achieve those in the spirit of new Panafricanism? Will we have one currency will have one passport. We have already said so under the Kigali agreement that we are going to have one passport, will we have one telephone code? We have 55 telephone codes. You move from Nairobi+254 you come here, you have another one. You go to Eritrea, you have another one. There is no connectivity in the 21st century. How can you be taken seriously? Those of you in the United States of America, you fly from Boston, Massachusetts to San Francisco in the west six hours, 40 minutes. The code is one. The tariff is one. The COVID test is one.
I moved from Nairobi to Addis Ababa, a COVID test. If I don’t travel this evening, I’ll be a subjected to another COVID test. I go to Tanzania, COVID test, Uganda, COVID test your nose will in debating with you. In the United States of America, you take one COVID test from Miami and you don’t take it as you go to St. Louis in Missouri, do you, I’m talking about very practical things. I come here and I have to go through an immigration. My passport has to be stamped. Somebody in the United States of America does not have to do that. Somebody in the European Union across 27 countries does not have to do that. In China, which is of course, 1.4 billion does not have to do that until we change all those things. We are going nowhere so that we have only one telephone code so that we have only one currency so that we have only a single immigration so that we eliminate all these armies.
You know, you look at some African countries and they have an army, which would complete with five star generals. And you money goes into men, maintaining militaries, maintaining embassies that you don’t need. You see how, why Africa is poor. All these 55 countries are embassies. If we were one, there would only be one ambassador of Africa in the United States of America, there would only be one army with regional policing. Am I being naive or simplistic? Yes. We can create a single Africa with a lose government, a confederate government dealing only with foreign affairs and defense and monetary policy and general policy formulation with different governance systems. That is the only way in which these tribal narrow tribal instincts will be dumped. But as long as, and now I want to conclude if we only see pan Africanism, as sentimentalism as a romantic idea about which we debate and we remain as we are, then this is the Africa that I see.
The Africa that I see in 25 years time is, many Africans, either legally or otherwise will break into different autonomous countries. Many of them will have more than 100 countries in Africa, each claiming self-determination and is already beginning to happen because we will be looking at narrow ethnic agenda as the only way of defining our affairs. Ethiopia will break down. Kenya will break down. Nigeria will break down. South Africa will break down and look at South Africa, only last week the whites in Western Cape in South Africa have delivered a petition to the government in Pretoria saying they want to create their own country. The democratic Republic of Congo will break down. Libya will break down the only way in which we can immunize ourselves against all those things is to create a pan African nation, which allows for self-determination within the nation. And we must redefine time, such self-determination. Self-determination must mean the ability of a people within a bigger unit to enjoy their culture, to enjoy their tradition, to speak their language. They do it.
BY HAFTU GEBREZABIHER
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD OCTOBER 19/2021
