African Union fonally adopts Swahili!

Two quick ones!

First there is the gratifying news coming from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, that the African Union has cancelled a decision taken by the Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahammat, to grant Israel an observer status in the 54 member body. Now, this is a welcome development by all accounts! Many will remember that Israel is basically an occupying power in Palestine. It is a replica of the discredited apartheid system that used to terrorise the indigenous peoples of Azania misnamed Suid Afrika! I know you may be arguing against the name, Azania, but bear with me, because I have a particular attachment to it thanks to my predisposition to the pan Africanist ideology of the Robert Sobukwe’s Pan African Congress. It was that ideology that fed the firebrands – men like Kgalemang Tumediso Motsetse, Motsamai Mpho and Phillip Matante - that would go on to form the Botswana People’s Party (BPP) in December 1960 exactly a year after the PAC broke away from the African National Congress (ANC). It’s significant that BPP went on to forge alliances with like-minded pan African organisations, such as the Convention People’s Party of Kwame Nkrumah in Ghana. Sadly though for the BPP, the Landrovers that were gifted the party by Nkrumah for the independence elections would be the cause for the party’s split – a fatal mistake that subsequently handed the conservative Bechuanaland Democratic Party (BDP) – formerly Tatiland Democratic Party, victory on a silver platter. And it was that BPP split, the mother of all splits, which placed a curse on opposition parties, a curse that has subsisted to present day. It remains to be seen if the two splits that have occurred in the BDP will prove sufficient fodder for the Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC) to dislodge the behemoth that is the BDP in 2024! However, my brief was to commend the African Union – whose predecessor – the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), worked tirelessly to liberate every corner of this continent through its Tanzanian-based OAU Liberation Committee. Of great importance here is to understand the ideology that handed us freedom following long-drawn liberation wars and struggles. It was the pan African ideology, which shunned imperialism in all its shades. For this reason, it was a stab in the back, in fact it was a sacrilegious act when we saw Moussa Faki Mahammat act unilaterally last year to grant the apartheid state of Israel, observer status in a body of such esteem and liberation credentials. But then, we understand that the AU has been captured by foreign powers. That is why it has no permanent representation in the United Nations Security Council in spite of one of its founders, Haile Selassie I, being a founding member of the United Nations in 1945 when it transformed from the League of Nations! Not only that, Africa boasts a population of over one billion people, yet these masses are not represented in a body that holds overwhelming power in terms of world security. This cannot be pardoned! Mahammat was simply out of line, in fact he should have been disciplined for usurping the role and authority of the AU’s highest decision making body – the Summit of Heads of State and Government– when he did what he did in his misguided quest to please his handlers, Israel, the United States of America and France! Now that his ill-conceived decision has been rescinded we can only trust that the Summit will do the needful and get rid of Israel from the hallowed halls of what used to be known as the Africa Hall in Menelik’s Flower Town, before it was corrupted by men and women who have no sense of history and only understand the language of donor financing!For that reason, that magnificent edifice you see in Addis Ababa was built and fully paid for by the Chinese government as a donation to Africa - woe betide us if we ascribe to ourselves the position of beggars in the comity of nations! I understand that the Heads of State and Government has decided to form a Presidential Committee made up of seven Presidents which has been tasked with coming up with recommendations for the next AU Summit in the second half of this year to put this matter of Israel’s observer status in the AU to rest!It’s important to understand why these foreign powers are falling all over Africa just like they did with that notorious ‘scramble for Africa’ that followed that heinous Berlin Conference of 1884 which partitioned this magnificent landmass into ‘spheres of influence’ for the colonising powers.It was basically economic reasons. And to be sure, nothing has changed since then! They will fight tooth and nail to ensure that the ambitious African Continental Free Trade Area (Agreement) fails, because if it takes off successfully, this will mark the end of Europe and America (the Western powers) as we know them!They will be weakened, because the ACfTA presupposes a renegotiation of many pacts that are unashamedly pro-West. Think not far, but take the example of the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPAs) – they make it sound like it is a partnership, but we all know it a lopsided arrangement that benefits Europe at the expense of Africa. The AcFTA is designed to correct these historical anomalies and injustices both economically and politically. So you can be sure that the West will not rest on its laurels and watch Africa get her house in order without causing a stink in the kitchen! So, Moussa Faki had provided that avenue, to cause the stink in the kitchen. I have faith that the Summit will act decisively! It cannot afford to break this organisation. Secondly, let me also commend the AU for having taken the decision to adopt kiSwahili as an official working language of the African Union. It has been a disgrace for an African organisation to use colonial languages to conduct its business.This nonsense of calling certain parts of Africa as Anglophone, Francophone or Lusophone must indeed come to an abrupt end. We must proudly affirm our identity as Africans by building consensus on what should constitute an African lingua franca! When the founding fathers met and agreed in May 1963 at the Charter Conference that the colonial languages plus any other African language that the OAU chooses, shall become the working languages of the organisation, that decision was not cast in stone. Just like the decision when they advised and cautioned African nations to respect colonial borders, this was neither cast in stone. With the ACFTA I am confident that given the right political mindset, we will radically alter the fate of this continent! Indeed, just as was said by Berhaine Selassie in his song, ‘Africa unite’, the continent awaits its creators. Africa is home for those at home and abroad. Let them all come and let us build this continent for ourselves and our posterity. Given the decision to adopt Swahili as a working language of the AU, I can only encourage that the language be taught in all African schools. Let us incorporate it in our curricular and teach it from primary right through to tertiary. [Repeated from last week]