Seeking influence, Egypt’s El-Sisi to chair African Union

Nearly six years after the African Union (AU) shut it out in the cold, Egypt will take the organization’s helm — and strengthening multilateral powers is unlikely to be on the agenda.

Cairo’s tenure “will probably concentrate on security and peacekeeping,” said Ashraf Swelam, who heads a think tank linked to the country’s Foreign Ministry.

Incoming AU chair President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi will likely focus less on “financial and administrative reform” than his predecessor, Swelam added.

Such reform was the cornerstone of outgoing AU chairman Paul Kagame’s year in the role.

The Rwandan president has pushed for a continent-wide import tax to fund the AU and reduce its dependence on external donors, who still pay for more than half the institution’s annual budget.

The near year-long lock out from the AU came after Egypt’s army deposed President Muhammad Mursi, who in 2012 had become the country’s first democratically elected president.

El-Sisi is due to take the helm at the AU’s biannual heads of state assembly, which takes place on Feb. 10 and 11 at the AU’s gleaming headquarters in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa.

As usual, the continent’s multiple security crises will be high on the VIPs’ agenda.

The single market is a flagship of the AU’s “Agenda 2063” program, conceived as a strategic framework for socioeconomic transformation. However, the trade pact has met resistance from South Africa.

El-Sisi will therefore need to push hard for ratification of this accord, if it is to come into effect. Rwanda’s ambitious funding proposal will also likely be on the table.