₦airaland Forum

AFRICAN UNION’S CONTRIBUTION AND COLLABORATION WITH THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY TO SETTLING AND MINIMIZING CONFLICTS.
African Union which was formerly the Organization of African Unity is a continental body consisting of 55 member states that make up the countries of the African continent. It was officially launched on 9th July, 2002 in Durban, South Africa, marking the demise of its predecessor (Organization of Africa Unity) after its 39years of existence. The OAU was formed in 1963 when many African leaders wanted to accelerate the process of European decolonization and independence for a new nation.
The African Union is guided by its vision of an integrated, prosperous and peaceful Africa, driven by its own citizens and representing a dynamic force in global arena.
The objectives of African Union are: to achieve greater unity, cohesion and solidarity between the African countries and nations, to defend the sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence of its member states and to accelerate the political and social economic integration of the continent.
The names of African Union in other official languages are: French-Union Africaine, Portuguese-Uniao Africana, Somali-Midawga Afrika, Spanish-Union Africana, Swahili-Umojo wa Afrika. The motto of African Union is ‘A United and Strong Africa,’ and its anthem is “Let Us All Unite and Celebrate Together”. Its political centres are Addis Ababa and Johannesburg with Lagos as the largest city. Official languages are Arabic, French, Spanish, Somali, and Swahili.
The first chairperson of African Union is Muamer Al Gathafi and the current chair person is Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt, the president of the Arab Republic of Egypt Feb 10, 2019. Other leaders are: the Commission chair – Moussa Faki and the parliamentary president as Roger Nkodo Dang.
The most important decisions of the African Union 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 African Union’s Secretariat, the African Union Commission, is based in Addis Ababa.
The Transition from the Organization of African Unity (OAU) to African Union (AU)
The advent of African Union (AU) can be seen or rather described as an event of great magnitude in the institutional evolution of the continent. On 9.9.1999, the heads of state and government of the organization of African Unity (OAU) issued a Declaration (the Sirte Declaration) calling for the establishment of an African Union, with a view, inter alia, to accelerating the process of integration in the continent to enable it play its rightful role in the global economy while addressing multifaceted social, economic and political problems compounded as they are by certain negative aspects of globalization.
African Union came as a result of a quest for unity, economic, and social development, African countries under the banner of the OAU, have taken various initiatives and made substantial progress in many areas which paved the way for the establishment of the AU.
The OAU initiatives paved the way for the birth of AU. In July 1999, the Assembly decided to convene an extraordinary session to expedite the process of economic and political integration in the continent. Since then, four (4) summits have been held leading to the official launching of the AU.
The Sirte Extraordinary Session (1999) decided to establish an AU.
The Lome Summit (2000) adopted the constitutive Act of the Union.
The Lusaka Summit (2001) drew the road map for the implementation of the AU.
The Durban Summit (2002) launched the AU and convened the first Assembly of the Heads of states of the African Union.
The transition from Organization of African Unity(OAU) to African Union(AU) was clearly intended to transform the institutional framework for realizing the Pan-African vision and mission from what some critics regarded as a mere ‘talking shop’ to an action oriented forum. It is therefore useful to take stock of the achievements of AU in its first decade and, this can be seen in the main goals of the AU which are peace and prosperity.
The African Union has been effective in boosting cooperation and unity within Africa, putting its efforts towards diminishing conflict and boosting democracy.
The AU has clearly had reasonable successes through its direct contribution and collaboration with the international community to settling and minimizing conflicts in some of the region’s hotbeds, such as trouble spots in the Sudan, resolving post-election violent conflicts in Cote d’lvoire and Kenya, and forcing military coup-makers to hand back power to civilian regimes, unlike the OAU which followed a doctrine of ‘non-interference’ the AU has the authority through decisions of its Peace and Security Council to interfere in member states to promote peace and protect democracy, including deploying military force in situations in which genocide and crimes against humanity are being committed. The AU’s unique voluntary ‘Peer Review Mechanism’ by which individual member states agree to be assessed by a team of experts drawn from other states is designed to encourage democracy and good governance.
In the pursuit of prosperity in the region, the AU has in place declarations and institutions to promote and support economic integration among its 54 member states as the pathway to sustainable development.
The African Union like any other organization or institution have a major challenge confronting it and its leaders which is how to respond to the job opportunities and livelihood aspirations of Africa’s youth who account for as much as three-quarters of the labour force in most countries; many have gone to schools and are graduates to become productive members of society, but end up being jobless. High and still rising levels of unemployment among young people in Africa prompted heads of state at the AU Summit in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, to adopt a ‘Declaration on Creating Employment for Empowerment’.
The AU rightly recognizes the demographic dividend to be reaped from the region’s youthful population structure, as numerous countries in Asia have benefited from over the past two decades, and, hence, member states are encouraged to link their growth performance and development pattern to the creation of employment and socio-economic opportunities especially for young people.
AU pays attention to international development cooperation and relationship with international partners than has hitherto been the case and to that regard, the headquarters of AU is now housed in a magnificent multi-million dollar complex in Addis Ababa that has been provided by the China as a ‘gift to Africa’ because of China’s eve growing presence in Africa, which the AU appears to regard as a positive factor.
The vision of a new, forward-looking, dynamic and integrated Africa will be fully realized through relentless struggle on several fronts and as a long term endeavour. The African Union has shifted focus from supporting liberation movements in the erstwhile African territories under colonialism and apartheid, as envisaged by the Organization of African Unity since 1963 and the Constitutive Act, to an Organization spear-heading Africa’s development and integration whose mission is that of an integrated, prosperous and peaceful Africa, driven by its own citizens and representing a dynamic force in global arena.

Jennifer Sunday.
Post Graduate Student of
Kaduna State University.

FORMATION AND POLITICS OF THE EUROPEAN UNION
FORMATION OF THE EUROPEAN UNION
The European Union is a political and economic Union of 28 members state located in Europe with an area of 4,475,757 km 2 and a population estimated at about 573 million. The Union developed an internal market through a standardized system of laws that apply in every member state in matter when all the members agreed as one.
Centuries following the fall of Rome in 476AD, individual European states saw themselves as Transition Imperi, that is, the transfer of rule of the dead Roman Empire, the Frankish Empire 481-43 and the holy Romans empire 962 - 1806,were by that tried to resurrect Rome in the west. This political view of a supra-national rule over the continent is similar to the example of the ancient Rome Empire proceeded in the early middle ages in the concept of a renovation Imperi which means a restoration of Empire. In which ever form either imperial “idea” or Christian Empire medieval Christendom and political power of the papacy, tends towards European integration and unity.
Within the occidental part of the countries the Russian Tsardom and most importantly the empire (1547-917) declared Moscow to be third Rome and inheritor of the eastern tradition after the fall of Constantinople in 1453 the gap between Greek east and Latin west had been widened by the political division of the Roman empire in the 4th Century and the great schism of 1054. And eventually widened again by Iron Curtain 1945 - 91.
The French and American Revolution after the demise of Napoleon’s empire 1804 -15 gave rise to the emergence of pan-European through which in the 19th Century truly emerged.
During the inter war period the consciousness that national market in Europe were reliant and kind of hostile together with the observation of a larger and growing US market.
By means of enlargement the European Union has grown from the six founding states (Belgium, France, West Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands, to currently 28 countries which joined up to the Union by been party to the founding treaties and with this subjecting themselves to the privileges and obligations of EU membership. This implies a partial delegation of sovereignty to the institution in return for representation within those institutions, a practice often referred to as polling sovereignty.
To suit membership, a country must meet the Copenhagen criteria defined at the 1993 meeting of the European Council in Copenhagen. These require a stable democracy that respect human right and the rule of law. A functioning market economy and the acceptance of the obligation of membership which include the AU’s law. Evaluation of a country fulfilment of the criteria is the responsibility of the European Council.
POLITICS OF THE EUROPEAN UNION
The EU operate through a hybrid system of supranational and inter-governmental decision-making and according to the fundamental assumptions of conferral (which says that, it should act only within the limits of the competences conferred on it by the treaties) and subsidiarity (which indicate that the Union should act only where an objective cannot be sufficiently achieved by the member states acting alone). EU’s laws are passed in different forms. The laws can generally be classified into two groups which are those which come into force without the necessity for national implementation measures, and those which specifically require national Implementation measures. In other words, they can be referred to as regulations and directions.
In line with the constitution, the EU bear some resembles to both a confederation and a federation it has also not formally define itself as either. It does not have a formal constitution. Its status is defined by the treaty of the European Union and treaty of the functioning of European Union. It is composed and coordinated than a traditional confederation of states because the general level of government widely employs qualified majority voting in some decision making among the members state rather than relying exclusively on unanimity. Because the EU is not a state in its own right it is less integrated than a federal state, sovereignty continue to flow from the bottom up from the several peoples of the separate members state, rather than from a single undifferentiated whole. This is reflected in the fact that the members state remain the masters of the treaties, retaining control over the allocation of competence the Union through constitutional change in that they employ control of the use of armed forces: they retain control of taxation and in that, they employ a right of unilateral withdrawal from the Union under Article 50 of the European Union. To add up, the principle of subsidiarity requires that the only matter that need to be determined collectively are so determined.
The Union is made up of seven principal decision-marking bodies, its institution, parliament, council, commission, court of justice, central bank and court of Auditors suitable in examining and amending legislation shared between the Council of the European Union and European parliament while executive tasks are performed by the European Commission and a limited capacity by the European Council. The monetary policy of the Eurozone is determined by the European Central Bank (ECB). Interpretation and application of EU laws and treaties are ensured by the court of justice of the European Union, the EU budget is scrutinized by the European Court of Auditors. There are also number of ancillary bodies which advice the EU or operates in a specific area.

By
Mercy Joseph Baba

THE TROUBLES WITH NAFTA UNDER PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP
With the emergence of a new trading agreement by the US president in November 2018 which was aimed at replacing the former existing trading body between the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) which has been in existence for about two decades and a half. The new agreement, tagged United State, Mexico and Canada (USMCA). USMCA is essentially NAFTA 2.0, with a few updates. The pact has a slight change which include changes for automakers, stricter labor and environmental standards, intellectual property protections, and digital trade provisions. The role of President Donald Trump cannot be under-estimated in the new dynamism of this trading relationship. Importantly, this change this did not come with surprise considering the fact that President Donald Trump of America has often attempted to drive the US alone as a unilateral power as against the idea of multilateralism. Some examples are the pulling of America out of the Paris Climate Accord and his attack on NATO where he described the later organization has obsolete. These are telling examples of his sentiments against multilateralism.
Under the current Trump era, the future of NAFTA looks bleak as the biggest global hegemony (the US) is pulling itself out of a trading body that needs America now than ever. Amidst the fact that Donald Trump has often championed the cause of America first, an organization in the Trading arena like NAFTA is needed to support the US plan of sustaining its global hegemony.
NAFTA has been undermined by Trump in an era that has seen the rise of right-wing campaigns; from the emergence of Trump’s presidency to the United Kingdom referendum, the elections victory in France of Le Pen, the surge of the Germany extreme right, Italy and Austria, as well as the growing of the extreme right in the Polish government, Bulgaria and Victor Oban style of leadership in Hungary – the stated development in one way or another express a neglect in political crisis in various aspects which justifies why Trump is still seen as a champion of the US project despite removing the US from a number of pacts.
Importantly, in a recent US government agenda where the country outlined a draft of the “annual trade policy agenda” of the United States Trade Representative, the Trump government stated in clear terms what the new relationship is going to look like under a new arrangement. Trump proposes reducing the trade deficit, punishing exchange manipulation and retaliating against unfair trade practices, exercised against the North American interests by non-market economy countries and countries with non-transparent and corrupt trade practices.
He protested against the TPP, signalling the end to the strategy to promote economic integration as the way to prevent the resurgence of nationalist sentiments and violent conflicts of interest. That was the idea behind the construction of the European Union and of the mega trade projects: the TPP and the TTIP, which were the instruments to consolidate USA geopolitical supremacy and to restore the political balance disrupted by the emergence of China as a main political and economic player.
According to President Trump, NAFTA is the most damaging trade agreement to US interests ever signed and Mexico is the biggest threat to national security and U.S. employment, which is why in his first State of the Union address he said: “The era of economic surrender is over. From now on, we expect trading relationships to be fair and to be reciprocal. NAFTA is the triumph of astute Mexican negotiators full of commitments prejudicial to the American national interest. He repeatedly highlights Mexico as the exclusive culprit (with no mention of Canada) of having deceived the US during the negotiations. Nothing could be farther from the truth. He reiterated his menaces to abandon NAFTA if the deal he wishes just after the bilateral Mexico-USA negotiations reach a partial agreement: “There is no political necessity to keep Canada in the new NAFTA deal. If we don’t make a fair deal for the US after decades of abuse, Canada will be out. Congress should not interfere with these negotiations or I will simply terminate NAFTA entirely and we will be far better off.
Such an untruthful picture of the agreement calls for an objective depiction of the negotiating process and a brief illustration of the trajectory of Mexican economy since NAFTA, to demonstrate that Trump’s criticisms are ill-intended and a pretext to impose a new round of negotiations under conditions of extreme power. At the press conference in Davos, he said: “NAFTA’s a horrible deal, we’re renegotiating it. I may terminate NAFTA, I may not – we’ll see what happens. But NAFTA was a – and I went around and I tell stadiums full of people, I'll terminate or renegotiate” during 2017 NBC interview. He adds negotiations are hard and risky because Mexico and Canada harvest all the gains. As late as March 5, 2018, Trump reiterated (in tweets) his assertion on the menace to American security from NAFTA and Mexico drug trafficking.
It is our opinion that Mexico must seize the current opportunity, redefine the policies institutionalized because of NAFTA, and undo the mistakes made in the initial NAFTA negotiations and the structural reforms since the mid-1980s up to now. The answer to this external shock, induced by the stubborn will is to change the norms that have governed bilateral relations for the last 24 years, could be the opportunity of serious reform to the model of national development. There will be losers and winners, it is true. Depending on the players who would lead the changes, it would be expected that balance will not be adverse to Labor as it was for the last 30 years.

BY: EUNICE YAMUSA
School of Post Graduate Kaduna State University.

AFCFTA AND THE PROSPECT OF INTRA-AFRICA TRADE, PROSPECT AND CHALLENGES

The Africa Continental Free Trade Area(AFCTA) is a laudable development building on existing initiatives for regional integration paving the way for more. The African continental free trade area is a free trade agreement among 54 of the 55 union nations aiming at creating a single continental market for goods and services as well as a custom union with free movement of capital and personal AFCFTA is the largest in the world in terms of participating countries since the formation of the world trade organization. The agreement was mediated by the African union (AU) and was signed on by 44 of its 55 member states in Kigali Rwanda on march 21, 2018. Initially the agreement requires members to remove traffics from 90% of goods allowing free access to commodities, goods and services across the continent. It was estimated that this agreement will boost intra-Africa trade by 52.3% percent by 2022, the agreement came into force on may 30 following ratification by 22 of the signatory states and entered its operational phase following a summit on July 7, 2019.
Intra-Africa trade is only about 10% of total Africa trade. AFCFTA is expected to help push up intra-Africa trade, the agreement which commits members to remove tariff allowing free movement of goods and services within the continents with 90% tariff off, tackling so-called non tariff, which usually hamper trade among Africa countries by easing the long border delay.
Expanded market and uninterrupted factor movements, labour, goods, services, capital and persons, promotion of economic development and facilitate quality job creation is expected under the AFCFTA, also intra-Africa trade is expected to grow by 33%.
Even though some are with the opinion that AFCFTA may end up favoring only rich African countries to the disadvantage of the poor countries, claiming that it may encourage more competition at both sector and enterprise levels and this may require the adoption of measures that will facilitate acquisition of skill by workers and restructuring of sectors, by that industrialized African countries may be able to take adequate of the market opportunities offered by AFCFTA while the countries with little or no industrialization may not put any industrial products on the big Africa market; meaning the benefits of AFCFTA may not be evenly distributed throughout all the African countries and industries, thereby creating losers and gainers.
However, many predicted that AFCFTA has the potential to redress some of the key obstacles the continent is facing, such as professional mobility and skill portability, a single African market will provide a conducive environment for easing some of this obstacles. There is immense potential for the continent to exploit, considering that majority of Africa migrants choose to stay on the continent and 70% of sub-Sahara migrants move within Africa. However, the success of AFCFTA will depend on the capacity of Africa governments not to neglect the potential of human capital. Africa youth are to be given the economic opportunities they deserve in a way that trade and business expansion should be reinforced to allow professional and educational mobility, and upskilling of Africa’s workforce.
AFCFTA would provide an umbrella and high threshold under which member states could negotiate specific goods and services to be exchanged under the common list as dictated by local conditions. Such list should aim to be more extensive (including manufactured goods) than the common lists of the COMESA and CAC STRs and apply reasonably high threshold.
AFCFTA has an important role to play in Africa’s development, through contributing to income generation structural transformation, job creation and good security, it holds great promise for Africa’s economic growth and development which can be achieved if Africa’s forge great partnership among all sections of society, between the government and the business community as well as between civil society organizations and the youth to drive Africa’s economic integration agenda. Also equal distribution of gains and benefits must be ensured.
By
Joseph Tukura
PG Student, Kaduna State University