Six questions to the candidates for the AU top job
Candidates for the position of AU Commission chairperson speak to the PSC Report about their plans should they get the job.
Heads of state of the African Union (AU) are set to elect a new chairperson of the AU Commission (AUC) at its 28th summit at the end of January.
Kenya’s candidate Amina Mohamed and Senegal’s candidate Abdoulaye Bathily responded to six questions from the PSC Report about their plans for the AUC.
Botswana’s Pelonomi Venson-Moitoi and Equatorial Guinea’s Agapito Mba Mokuy responded to the same questions in the run-up to the first round of voting last year.
What is your vision of the position of chairperson of the AUC?
Bathily (Senegal):
In my view, the holder of the office must:
- Have a solid grasp of the history of the peoples of Africa, including the full range of factors that have shaped and continue to influence Africa
- Be a visionary who is able to embody both the aspirations of the peoples of Africa and the will of the AU Assembly of Heads of State and Government
- Faithfully bear the hopes and concerns of current and future generations of Africans and work with other organs of the AU to ensure that the programmes and actions will contribute to cement the unity, solidarity and independence of Africans
- Provide an effective interface with Executive Council and the Permanent Representatives Committee in order to ensure the effective functioning of the Commission and coordinating of the work of the Commission with the rest of the AU Organs and the Regional Economic Communities(RECs)
- Mobilise member states and all other stakeholders behind a unified strategy for the transformation of the continent and advocate for the AU’s agenda on peace and democracy
- Ensure a strategically targeted visibility for Africa in contemporary international affairs and give a voice to African interests and concerns in global economic and political governance
Mohamed (Kenya):
At a time when the world is witnessing historic and rapid economic and political changes, my vision of the position of the AUC chairperson is to provide inspirational and transformative leadership that will keep the AUC solidly focused on implementing at its very best, Africa’s blueprint for development: Agenda 2063, and attending to the interest of African peoples.
The primary goals of Agenda 2063 are to promote peace, security and stability on the continent |
|
The primary goals of Agenda 2063 are to promote peace, security and stability on the continent and to promote greater unity and solidarity between African countries and the peoples of Africa, as stated in the Constitutive Act of the AU. Political tranquillity, security, good governance, unity and justice in turn will constitute the foundation of widely shared prosperity and dignity of all Africa’s peoples.
The path towards the realisation of these objectives is clearly laid out in the seven aspirations of Agenda 2063, which stress widely-shared and sustainable growth, continental integration, good governance, cultural identity, attention to the special needs of African youth and women and the emergence of Africa as a respected player in global issues.
What would be your priorities as chairperson of the AU Commission?
Bathily:
Conscious of the role and place of the AUC as a central engine room of the AU, it will be my priority as chairperson to:
- Ensure that the Commission itself is restructured and equipped to function with efficiency and coherence in the execution of its programmes
- Strengthen synergies between the Commission, the Executive Council and the Permanent Representatives Committee
- Reignite the pan-African ideal in the popular imagination of all Africans and peoples of African descent
- Reinforce the principle and practice of gender parity at all levels in the Commission
- Place the question of the sustainable funding of the AU by the governments and peoples of Africa on the front burner
- Revamp the preventive diplomacy capacity and role of the AU and its peacekeeping functions
- Deepen the interface between the AU Commission, RECs and the NEPAD agency
- Drive the implementation of the first 10-year plan of Agenda 2063
- Ensure that Africa’s voice and position are heard on issues of climate change, in the follow-up to the COP22 in Marrakech
Mohamed:
 It will be my priority as chairperson to ensure that the Commission itself is restructured |
|
Peace and security are a precondition for the dignity of African peoples, [as are] widely shared prosperity, good governance and justice and democracy, as enshrined in the AU statutes. For this reason one of the top priorities of my tenure would be the winding down of the remaining conflicts in Africa, followed, where necessary, by peacekeeping operations and comprehensive efforts to strengthen Africa’s fragile states. In this, the AU’s Peace and Security Council must work closely with the African heads of state, the United Nations (UN) and the international community on a case-by-case basis.
Secondly, after a decade and a half of posting some of the highest records of economic growth in the developing world, African economies are slowing down. Given the promise of poverty reduction set out in Agenda 2063 and under the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the AUC, with strategic partners, now needs to urgently review the near-term African development strategy to see what could be done to shore up rapid growth with poverty reduction and widely shared prosperity. This is especially urgent because global commitments to multilateral institutions appear to be weakening.
Thirdly, the AUC and the various specialised AU agencies have rendered some remarkable services to Africa, and it deserves our compliments for that, but at same time, a decade and a half of experience is enough to enable us to review the AUC’s architecture, its relationship to the RECs, and the prospects for realising Agenda 2063. Appropriate reforms to accelerate action can then be undertaken.
AU member states can undertake none of these, and other priorities not listed here, without sufficient financial contributions. Budgetary self-sufficiency is already a strategic priority, which the Assembly of Heads of State and Government of the AU is seized with.
As chairperson of the AUC my immediate responsibility will be to ensure that the structures to implement the decisions on financing and ensuring proper accountability for resources are in place and working.
How do you propose to improve the AU’s conflict prevention capacity?
Bathily:
| The AUC now needs to urgently review the near-term African development strategy |
|
Conflicts in Africa have both structural roots and proximate triggers. It is important that even as we address the immediate triggers of conflicts, such as violent disputes over the results of elections, we keep in mind that root causes of conflicts such as chronic poverty, widening inequality, prolonged youth unemployment and broad social exclusion, as well as the deep-rooted effects of neo-colonialism, are also addressed.
To this end, it is my intention to give much greater vigour to the social and economic pillars of the work of the AUC in order to enhance the Commission’s capacity to work with the relevant institutions of member states to further develop, strengthen and implement policies aimed at addressing the structural roots of conflicts.
Preventive diplomacy is one of the most critical political functions of the Commission but, in comparison to the investments that have been put into peacekeeping activities after conflicts have broken out, it is a highly underdeveloped domain of the work of the AU. I believe that this disequilibrium needs to be redressed through investment in preventive diplomacy at different levels.
It is also important for the AUC to take a closer interest in the outcomes of the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), with a view to obtaining information that could feed into the Early WarningSystem.
As we aim to ‘silence the guns’ by 2020 in accordance with the AU’s 50th Anniversary Solemn Declaration, we also need to prioritise the issue of climate change and human security. We are already witnessing the impacts of climate change, which, if left unattended, can result in cross-border conflicts due to food and water shortages. This has the potential to displace people from their communities, resulting in huge numbers of environmental refugees across the continent.
Mohamed:
My approach is informed by the need to consider local context and work together to strengthen systems and create resilient communities within the prevailing circumstances in each member state. This approach requires home-grown solutions that take cognisance of societal differences. Conflict resolution is not ‘a one size fits all’ solution.
| We are already witnessing the impacts of climate change, which can result in cross-border conflicts |
|
My aim will be to strengthen the overall capacity of the African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA) framework and ensure that it is better funded than it is now. A review of APSA’s progress since 2003 would be part of the wider assessment of the AU structures referred to above.
The APRM provides another opportunity to address the causes of conflict in Africa.
At this stage, it will also be necessary to strengthen the Early Warning System as a preventive mechanism. From the experience of AU peacemaking operations in Darfur, Burundi, Comoros and Somalia, there is emerging evidence than inadequate funding is the Achilles heel of African conflict resolution initiatives. The answer to this overall problem lies in significant contributions by African states to the AU Peace Fund. The top priority of my reforms in APSA will be to convince the AU member states to honour and increase their pledges to the AU Peace Fund.
How would you improve good governance and development on the continent?
| My aim will be to strengthen the overall capacity of the African Peace and Security Architecture |
|
Bathily:
There is no shortage of proposals, even within the Constitutive Act of the AU, for improving good governance and development on our continent.
My chief interest will be to ensure that instruments and decisions on good governance and continental development are implemented.
I hope also that as a Commission we would more fully work with citizen groups in member states as partners in the advancement of a progressive governance and development agenda.
Mohamed:
Both the AU Constitutive Act and the AU Agenda 2063 provide clear guidelines on what is expected of AU members as far as good governance is concerned. In addition, all AU member states are signatories to the AU Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance, and the AU Convention on Preventing and Combating Corruption. They are also signatories to the UN Charter and the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It would therefore be necessary to remind all AU member states of their obligations under these statutes.
More importantly, the AU must continue to strengthen the on-going governance reform work under the APRM. During my tenure the AU will widen the coverage of the APRM and ensure that the people of Africa feel its impact as a good governance-enhancing tool.
We also need to address the bottlenecks hindering the effective socioeconomic transformation of the African continent. I will collaborate with the AU’s strategic partners in development – the AfDB [African Development Bank], UNECA [UN Economic Commission for Africa] and the UNDP [UN Development Programme] – to ensure that African states adopt new development strategies suited to evolving global circumstances. My office will also bring the African private sector into the continent’s development dialogue. The continent now has a strong and growing contingent of indigenous investors that needs to be heard.
How do you intend to work with African leaders to ensure that Africa consistently fights impunity?
Bathily:
The question of impunity is one that has occupied a headline status in discussions on African governance in recent years, especially since the 1994 Rwandan genocide that shook the world. I want to be very clear from the outset: nobody anywhere in the world, no matter their station in life, is entitled to commit crimes such as mass murder and expect not to have to answer for their actions.It is precisely in recognition of this that, at the founding of the AU, the principle of non-interference that was at the heart of the making of the OAU [Organization of African Unity] was refined in the context of a new doctrine of non-indifference.
I intend to work on the basis of this evolution in approach to ensure that the Assembly is alive to its responsibility of ensuring that none of its peers commits acts of impunity for which they can expect not to have to answer.
Non-indifference means a robust peer-to-peer engagement by leaders with one another when all the signals point to the potentiality of a crime, and the AUC should boldly help facilitate such an engagement.
| Nobody is entitled to commit international crimes and expect not to have to answer for their actions |
|
The APRM, which must be further reinforced, provides an additional instrument for driving a no-holds-barred engagement by African leaders with difficult political problems. Regional and continental institutions of justice, including special tribunals that the Assembly might decide to create from time to time, must also be enabled in all senses to exercise their functions as critical continental instances of redress. Similarly, the Union has an interest, in line with the shared values of its members, to both strengthen national institutions of justice and ensure that they function with autonomy and credibility in tackling cases of political violence brought before them. Unhappiness by African countries with the record of the ICC [International Criminal Court] is one that has been expressed at the level of the Assembly, but amid the different positions that have been taken, I feel strongly encouraged that no country has questioned the basic principle that impunity cannot be condoned.
Mohamed:
African membership of organisations that address the protection and promotion of human rights and the fight against impunity like the Human Rights Council and the UN General Assembly is a clear indication of African leaders’ commitment to dealing with this vice.
If elected, I will work with African leaders to promote good governance and support the fight against impunity, which is a global war. I will support the mainstreaming of Africa’s own mechanisms of fighting impunity within the Constitutive Act of the AU, which addresses impunity as a priority.
The most effective way to ensure that Africa fights impunity in all forms is to ensure that all AU member states have established judicial systems within their boundaries that can credibly deal with the problem using internationally accepted standards of justice. Where that capacity is demonstrably lacking, then African-grown systems should be resorted to. To that extent, the AU Commission should make all efforts to institutionalise the African Court of Justice and Human Rights.
How will you make sure the AU becomes self-reliant?
Bathily:
There is a strong awareness in Africa that, for the sake of credibility and dignity, we cannot continue to sweep aside the issue of the financing of continental institutions that we decide by ourselves to create. It is in this light that the Kaberuka report was debated at the Kigali Summit in July 2016 and a concrete decision taken. If this is speedily and faithfully implemented, we will have taken an important first bold step towards finding an enduring resolution to the funding of our continental body. It will be a great day for Africa.
Mohamed:
There is only one unambiguous way in which to make the AU financially self-reliant: this is to ensure that member states of the AU take full ownership of AU programmes by honouring their financial commitments to the Union.
As the AU Chairperson I will work with the AU heads of state and government to ensure the effective implementation of the Kigali decision on financing, whose objective is to reduce the number of member states that fall behind in their annual contributions to the AU. I will also work with the AU Executive Council to regularly review the mechanisms to balance the AU budget with the revenue.
Another top priority for me will be implementing the mandated reform measures and putting in place an effective accountability framework. Member states entrust the Commission with resources and tools to deliver on specific mandates. I will therefore provide the necessary leadership for the Commission to honour this trust by ensuring that the resources are properly applied and that member states, and other partners that support Union programmes, get value for their money. This way, the Commission will demonstrate that it is up to the task of supporting member states to realise the great vision and aspirations spelt out in Agenda 2063.
Picture: ©Jacqueline Cochrane/ISS
