Title: Mkapa bids AU farewell
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Mkapa bids AU
farewell
2005-09-01 07:43:41
By Sihle
Mavuso
President
Benjamin Mkapa has challenged African leaders to fight for the
economic liberation of the continent before it is too late.
President Mkapa made the remarks when he met with the
Chairman of the African Union Commission, Alpha Oumar Konare, in
Addis Ababa yesterday.
He said there was no future for
Africa in the current economic set-up, bearing in mind that the
continent was currently being viewed solely as a source of raw
materials for the developed world.
Africa had experienced
the horrors of the slave trade and colonialism for many years, he
said, adding that the two eras laid the foundation for the
continent’s inferiority on the global stage.
’If we want a
better future for the continent and the coming generations, we must
sufficiently be agitated to robustly fight the manifestly unjust
economic relations in a global world. The two years I have spent as
the co-chairman of the World Commission on the Social Dimension of
Globalisation convinced me that Africa is the loser,’ he said.
President Mkapa added that Africa had to fight its
insignificance in world trade and provision of services in the
era of globalisation.
’There was once a suggestion from some
quarters that Africa should be satisfied with aid and agree not to
participate in the World Trade Organisation talks. The argument was
that we were too insignificant as a player in the global market and
a distraction when the big players talk.’
He said studies
had shown that Africa lacked proper structures for kick-starting
aggressive economic growth that would match international standards
and the demands of globalization.
The time had come for
Africa to put all plans that have been conceived into action, the
President added.
We speak about these injustices in meetings
and conferences, but we do not aggressively develop and implement
the necessary strategies to deal with them as a continent.
We must also work towards changing our direction in trade.
We are concentrating too much on Europe and America,
forgetting that there is Asia, another player in trade, he said.
President Mkapa also bid Konare farewell ahead of the
Tanzanian head of state’s retirement later this year.
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