The Executive Chairman of the Centre for Strategic African Development (CENSADEV), Alan Kyerematen, has called on African leaders to embrace bold reforms to help expedite the integration of the continent.
“For Africa to be fully integrated and interconnected, it will require critical reforms in three separate but interrelated areas.
“First is legal and regulatory reform of the AU, including but not limited to its governance architecture.
“Second is institutional reform, including restructuring and reorienting some of the existing continental institutions; but more importantly, establishing new ones and structures that will help form a new united Africa.
“Third is policy and programme reform, which will provide the foundation for the implementation and execution of Africa’s new development agenda,” he said.
Mr Kyerematen was speaking at a two-day Africa summit in Accra yesterday, on the theme: “Building a new united Africa.”
The summit was organised by CENSADEV, a CSO, in collaboration with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the AU and Economic, Social and Cultural Council (ECOSOCC).
In attendance were the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa; a former President of Sierra Leone, Ernest Bai Koroma, the Guest Speaker, and the Presiding Officer of ECOSOCC, Louis Cheick Sissoko.
Others are political leaders and senior policy makers, parliamentarians, corporate executives, representatives from academia, CSOs and development partners.
It is aimed at forging solutions for a more united Africa, shaping policy across various strategic sectors, accelerating trade and economic integration, and positioning Africa as the next frontier of global power.
AfCFTA
Mr Kyerematen said it was about time leaders realised that Africa would not integrate by itself, but must be engineered carefully, strategically, tactically and intentionally.
He said that although the establishment of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) was a major step in the continent’s integration strategy, it was not sufficient to achieve a continental integration.
“The time has now come for us as Africans to take critical steps to fill the gaps between what is necessary and what is sufficient,” Mr Kyerematen added.
Challenges
For his part, Mr Ablakwa said the global environment within which Africa must pursue its integration agenda was undergoing rapid transformation.
He said the once touted unipolar world was fast fading into oblivion, paving the way for geopolitical rivalries with supply chain reconfigurations, climate change, pandemics, digitalisation, and artificial intelligence reshaping the international order.
The minister said Africa’s fragmentation was no longer merely a developmental challenge, but a serious vulnerability which needed the continent to transform itself from being passive observers to an active shaper of global outcomes.
This, he said, would require a united African voice, coordinated diplomacy, and collective economic action as widely asserted by many.
“Integration enhances resilience, disunity magnifies vulnerability.
It is in this regard that we align with those who believe that the AfCFTA represents one of the most ambitious economic integration projects in modern history,” he said.
Source:
www.graphic.com.gh
