By Prince Kurupati
To add to the list of African Union, ECOWAS, COMESA, SADC and the like, Africa now has another regional grouping. The new body goes by the name African Political Alliance and it’s the brainchild of Prof Robert Dussey, Togo’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, African Integration and Togolese Abroad.
The inaugural gathering of the African Political Alliance was held on 3 May 2023 in Lomé, Republic of Togo. In attendance at the inaugural gathering were Foreign Ministers and Heads of delegations from the Republic of Angola, Burkina Faso, the Central African Republic, the Gabonese Republic, the Republic of Guinea, the State of Libya, the Republic of Mali, the Republic of Namibia, the United Republic of Tanzania and the Republic of Togo. Chairing the gathering was Mrs. Victoire Tomegah-Dogbe, Prime Minister of the Republic of Togo, and Prof. Robert Dussey.
In launching APA, Prime Minister Tomegah-Dogbe said Togo had been moved by the problems bedeviling Africa as a whole, particularly on the geopolitical and diplomatic fronts. Prime Minister Tomegah-Dogbe said the time has come for Africa “significantly review its relationship with the rest of the world for its better representativeness within multilateral institutions of collective action and in global governance”.
The Togolese Prime Minister said the challenges that Africa face on the geopolitical and diplomatic fronts are immense and as such, they need out-of-the-box solutions. It’s against this background that APA, an informal regional grouping, was established. Its mission is to come up with context-specific, out-of-the-box solutions devised by Africa for Africa.
As an informal regional grouping, Prime Minister Tomegah-Dogbe said APA is not here as an adversary to the usual already existing cooperation frameworks but it’s there as a complimentary partner. She said APA’s efforts are largely geared towards uniting the ideas of African nations which share the same Pan-Africanism ideals as well as all those “determined to work for an uninhibited, politically strong, non-aligned, independent (Africa) and acting with sovereignty on the international scene.”
Among the issues discussed by all countries in attendance were “the challenges and prospects relating to the strategic positioning, sovereignty and expression of Africa’s common positions on the international scene”. The African Foreign Affairs ministers also “examined issues and current challenges of pan-Africanism and African renaissance, the challenges of strengthening cooperation and endogenous capacities to respond to terrorism, as well as the main axes of cooperation and the institutional outlines of the African Political Alliance.”
Following, the discussions, the African Foreign Affairs Ministers reached a consensus on several issues. Perhaps the most important one was the call for broader action to be taken to ensure that Africa gets permanent seats on the UN Security Council. The Ministers agreed that it’s unacceptable for “Africa, which alone brings together almost 28 % of United Nations member states” not to have a permanent Security Council seat. APA reaffirmed the Ezulwini Consensus and Sirte Declaration but said Africa does not need one but “two (2) permanent member seats with full privileges including the right of veto, as well as five (5) non-member seats of the Security Council.”
APA also “affirmed their attachment to the principle of non-alignment laid down in 1963 by the defunct Organization of African Unity (OAU) as being one of the essential principles that should structure the relationship of the newly independent African countries with the rest of the world.” This when put in the context of the contemporary Russia-Ukraine War is quite significant as external powers are pushing African nations to pick sides between the warring parties.
On the Pan Africanism front, APA recognized the role and importance of the Pan Africanism movement in liberating the continent from the york of colonialism. It concluded that some of the challenges facing Africa today can be corrected when nations embrace the ideas of Pan-Africanism. Determined to see this turn into reality, APA has already struck a deal with the African Union to hold the 9th Pan-African Congress in Lomé, in 2024. The congress will run under the theme, “Renewal of pan-Africanism and Africa’s Role in the Reform of Multilateral Institutions: mobilizing resources and reinventing Itself for action”.
At the end of the gathering, a decision was agreed upon to start formalizing APA. Togo was tasked with chairing the high-level committee “responsible for working on the founding reference texts, the main lines of cooperation and the institutional outlines of the African Political Alliance.” The high-level committee was given a six-month window to formalize APA and it is also tasked with setting the date for the next meeting.
A glimpse at the discussions that took place during the inaugural APA meeting shows that the grouping aims at addressing many of the issues Africa has been battling with for far too long. A deep look at APA’s mission, objective and goals will just add to the nobleness of this grouping.
Despite how noble APA’s mission, objectives and goals look, one question still comes to mind. APA comes into a field that already has other actors. Its mission is more or less similar to the missions of these other actors. As such, will APA be successful and achieve all its objectives, chief among them getting permanent spots for Africa on the UN Security Council? Well, the best answer at this time is, time will tell. The hope is that APA is that regional grouping which will finally do away with elitist deliberations with no end product and rather act, as a vehicle to bring about much-needed change.
*Culled from June Issue of PAV Magazine
