African Union


The African Union is a continental union of 55 member states located on the continent of Africa. The AU was announced in the Sirte Declaration in Sirte, Libya, on 9 September 1999, calling for the establishment of the African Union. The bloc was launched on 9 July 2002 in Durban, South Africa. The intention of the AU was to replace the Organisation of African Unity, established on 25 May 1963 in Addis Ababa by 32 signatory governments; the OAU was disbanded on 9 July 2002. The most important decisions of the AU are made by the Assembly of the African Union, a semi-annual meeting of the heads of state and government of its member states.
The AU's secretariat, the African Union Commission, is based in Addis Ababa. The largest city in the AU is Lagos, Nigeria, while the largest urban agglomeration is Cairo, in Egypt. The African Union has more than 1.3 billion people and an area of around and includes world landmarks such as the Sahara and the Nile. The primary working languages are Arabic, English, French, Portuguese, Spanish, and Swahili. Within the African Union, there are official bodies, such as the Peace and Security Council and the Pan-African Parliament.
At the 2023 G20 meeting held in New Delhi, India, the African Union was admitted as the twenty-first member of the G20.

Overview

The objectives of the African Union are:
  1. To achieve greater unity, cohesion and solidarity among the African countries and African nations.
  2. To defend the sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence of its Member States.
  3. To accelerate the political and social-economic integration of the continent.
  4. To promote and defend African common positions on issues of interest to the continent and its peoples.
  5. To encourage international cooperation, taking due account of the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
  6. To promote peace, security, and stability on the continent.
  7. To promote democratic principles and institutions, popular participation and good governance.
  8. To promote and protect human and peoples' rights in accordance with the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights and other relevant human rights instruments.
  9. To establish the necessary conditions which enable the continent to play its rightful role in the global economy and in international negotiations.
  10. To promote sustainable development at the economic, social and cultural levels as well as the integration of African economies.
  11. To promote co-operation in all fields of human activity to raise the living standards of African people.
  12. To coordinate and harmonise the policies between the existing and future Regional Economic Communities for the gradual attainment of the objectives of the Union.
  13. To advance the development of the continent by promoting research in all fields, in particular in science and technology.
  14. To work with relevant international partners in the eradication of preventable diseases and the promotion of good health on the continent.
The African Union is made up of both political and administrative bodies. The highest decision-making organ is the Assembly of the African Union, made up of all the heads of state or government of member states of the AU. The Assembly is chaired by João Lourenço, President of Angola. The AU also has a representative body, the Pan-African Parliament, which consists of 265 members elected by the national legislatures of the AU member states. Its president is Fortune Z. Charumbira.
Other political institutions of the AU include:
The AU Commission, the secretariat to the political structures, is chaired by Mahamoud Ali Youssouf of Djibouti.
Other AU structures are hosted by different member states:
The AU's first military intervention in a member state was the May 2003 deployment of a peacekeeping force of soldiers from South Africa, Ethiopia, and Mozambique to oversee the implementation of the various agreements in Burundi. AU troops were also deployed in Sudan for peacekeeping during the Darfur Conflict, before the mission was handed over to the United Nations on 1 January 2008 via UNAMID. The AU has a peacekeeping mission in Somalia, consisting of troops from Uganda and Burundi.
The AU has adopted a number of important new documents establishing norms at the continental level, to supplement those already in force when it was created. These include the African Union Convention on Preventing and Combating Corruption, the African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance, the New Partnership for Africa's Development and its associated Declaration on Democracy, Political, Economic and Corporate Governance.

History

The historical foundations of the African Union originated in the First Congress of Independent African States, held in Accra, Ghana from 15 to 22 April 1958. The conference was aimed at establishing Africa Day to annually mark the liberation movement concerning the willingness of the African people to free themselves from colonial rule, as well as subsequent attempts to unite Africa, including the Organisation of African Unity, which was established on 25 May 1963, and the African Economic Community in 1991. Critics argued that the OAU in particular did little to protect the rights and liberties of African citizens from their own political leaders, often dubbing it the "Dictators' Club".
The idea of creating the AU was revived in the mid-1990s under the leadership of Libyan head of state Muammar al-Gaddafi; the heads of state and governments of the OAU issued the Sirte Declaration on 9 September 1999, calling for the establishment of an African Union. The Declaration was followed by summits at Lomé in 2000, when the Constitutive Act of the African Union was adopted, and at Lusaka in 2001, when the plan for the implementation of the African Union was adopted. During the same period, the initiative for the establishment of the New Partnership for Africa's Development was also established.
The African Union was launched in Durban on 9 July 2002 by its first chairperson, former South African head of state Thabo Mbeki, at the first session of the Assembly of the African Union. The second session of the Assembly was held in Maputo in 2003 and the third session in Addis Ababa was held on 6 July 2004.
Since 2010, the African Union eyes the establishment of a joint African space agency.
Barack Obama was the first-ever sitting United States president to speak in front of the African Union in Addis Ababa on 29 July 2015. During his speech, he encouraged the world to increase economic ties via investments and trade with the continent and lauded the signs of progress made in education, infrastructure and economy. However, he also criticized a lack of democracy and leaders who refuse to step down, discrimination against minorities and corruption. He suggested an intensified democratization and free trade to significantly increase living quality for Africans.

Treaties

Politics

The African Union has a number of official bodies:
; Pan-African Parliament : To become the highest legislative body of the African Union. The seat of the PAP is at Midrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. The Parliament is composed of 265 elected representatives from all 55 AU states, and intended to provide popular and civil-society participation in the processes of democratic governance. Its president is Roger Nkodo Dang, of Cameroon.
; Assembly of the African Union: Composed of heads of state and heads of government of AU states, the Assembly is currently the supreme governing body of the African Union. It is gradually devolving some of its decision-making powers to the Pan-African Parliament. It meets once a year and makes its decisions by consensus or by a two-thirds majority. The current chair of the AU is President Macky Sall, President of Senegal.
; African Union Commission : The secretariat of the African Union, composed of ten commissioners and supporting staff and headquartered in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. In a similar fashion to its European counterpart, the European Commission, it is responsible for the administration and coordination of the AU's activities and meetings.
; Court of Justice of the African Union: The Constitutive Act provides for a Court of Justice to rule on disputes over interpretation of AU treaties. A protocol to set up this Court of Justice was adopted in 2003 and entered into force in 2009. It was, however, superseded by a protocol creating an African Court of Justice and Human Rights, which will incorporate the already established African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights and have two chambers: one for general legal matters and one for rulings on the human rights treaties.
; Executive Council: Composed of ministers designated by the governments of member states. It decides on matters such as foreign trade, social security, food, agriculture and communications, is accountable to the Assembly, and prepares material for the Assembly to discuss and approve. It is chaired by Shawn Makuyana of Zimbabwe.
; Permanent Representatives' Committee: Consisting of nominated permanent representatives of member states, the Committee prepares the work for the Executive Council, similar to the role of the Committee of Permanent Representatives in the European Union.
; Peace and Security Council : Proposed at the Lusaka Summit in 2001 and established in 2004 under a protocol to the Constitutive Act adopted by the AU Assembly in July 2002. The protocol defines the PSC as a collective security and early-warning arrangement to facilitate timely and effective response to conflict and crisis situations in Africa. Other responsibilities conferred to the PSC by the protocol include prevention, management and resolution of conflicts, post-conflict peace building and developing common defence policies. The PSC has fifteen members elected on a regional basis by the Assembly. Similar in intent and operation to the United Nations Security Council.
; Economic, Social and Cultural Council:An advisory organ composed of professional and civic representatives, similar to the European Economic and Social Committee. The chair of ECOSOCC, elected in 2008, is Cameroonian lawyer Akere Muna of the Pan-African Lawyers Union.
; Specialised Technical Committees: Both the Abuja Treaty and the Constitutive Act provide for Specialised Technical Committees to be established made up of African ministers to advise the Assembly. In practice, they have never been set up. The ten proposed themes are: Rural Economy and Agricultural Matters; Monetary and Financial Affairs; Trade, Customs, and Immigration; Industry, Science and Technology; Energy, Natural Resources, and Environment; Transport, Communications, and Tourism; Health; Labour, and Social Affairs; Education, Culture, and Human Resources.
; Financial institutions
These institutions have not yet been established; however, the Steering Committees working on their founding have been constituted. Eventually, the AU aims to have a single currency.
; Health: The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, founded in 2016 and launched in 2017. Its Headquarters are in Addis Ababa Ethiopia.
; Human rights: The African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, in existence since 1986, is established under the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights rather than the Constitutive Act of the African Union. It is the premier African human rights body, with responsibility for monitoring and promoting compliance with the African Charter. The African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights was established in 2006 to supplement the work of the commission, following the entry into force of a protocol to the African Charter providing for its creation. It is planned that the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights will be merged with the Court of Justice of the African Union.
; Space: The African Space Agency was officially formed in 2023. It is headquartered in Cairo.
; Energy: The African Energy Commission was founded in 2008, and is based in Algiers.