• UN expresses desire to support Africa’s stability
BY GIRMACHEW GASHAW
ADDIS ABABA- A more fruitful, more concrete and more active inter-African solidarity is a key factor to curtail the unprecedented expansion of terrorism and the dangerous resurgence of unconstitutional regime changes in Africa, Chairperson of the African Union Commission (AUC) said.
AUC Chairperson Moussa Faki Mahamat made the above statement while opening the 35th Ordinary Session of the Africa Union Assembly yesterday.
Noting the dangerous expansion unlawfulness demands a stronger international response, Mahamat stressed that inter-African solidarity has an indispensable role in creating a peaceful and harmonious continent. It is particularly disconcerting to see, here and there, the desire for non-African partners to support African countries under attack meanwhile many African nations idly when the neighboring houses are burning.
As to him, the security situation of Africa now calls for a real and new approach that examines Africa’s peace and security architecture and its correlation with the emerging factors that disrupt the continent’s stability. “In the absence of this burst of intelligence and decision, I have serious questions about the future of our flagship project to silence the guns by the deadline.”
“The context marked by these two scourges would have made it possible to glimpse the glimmers of hope if the world were not the one where national egoism, withdrawal into oneself and the collapse of the values of solidarity and generosity fruits of our common humanity are tarnished at a glance. The profound and irrefutable truth; however, is that no part of international society can be reassured about its fate while all the other parts are not. There is a crisis of multilateralism.”
The Chairperson further highlighted that the attempts to approach Africa are multiple and this undoubtedly indicates an increased interest in the continent, but this interest has not yet frankly translated into a substantial development list consideration in favor of the latter. “I am not far from thinking intensely that such a plan; however necessary, will never come from the outside. Here, more than ever, African leadership is forcefully challenged for a burst of mobilization of endogenic resources that reveals the immense potential of the continent. There is no salvation except in this African direction for Africa.”
In his video address to the Summit, the U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said cooperation between the U.N. and the African Union will be stronger than ever before as injustice is deeply set in global systems as the time requires to pay the heaviest price in line with Africans. “The unethical inequalities that suffocate Africa fuel armed conflict, political, economic, ethnic and social tensions, human rights abuses, violence against women, terrorism, military coups and a sentiment of impunity.”
Meanwhile, often criticized for its apparent inconsistencies in responding to sporadic crises on the continent of 1.3 billion people, the AU, which will celebrate its 20th anniversary in July, has elected 15 members for its Peace and Security Council.
The 35th Summit is expected to pass imperative decisions on major challenges that the continent has been facing including terrorism and COVID-19. The continent lays aspirations in the incoming AU chair Macky Sall of Senegal, who yesterday received authority from the outgoing President Felix Tshisekediof Congo in terms of addressing the bottlenecks of Africa and coming up with wonderful ideas that ensure peace and security.
The February 6/2022
