ADDIS ABABA: The African Union (AU) holds its annual summit in Ethiopia this weekend at a time of genocide, myriad insurgencies and coups stretching from one end of the continent to the other, for which it has few answers.<\/p>\n
The AU, formed in 2002, has 55 member states who are often on opposing sides of conflicts. They have routinely blocked attempts to hand real enforcement power to the AU that could constrain their action, leaving it under-funded and under-equipped.<\/p>\n
It has missed successive deadlines to make itself self-funding \u2014 in 2020 and 2025. Today, it still relies for 64 percent of its annual budget on the United States and European Union, who are cutting back support.<\/p>\n
Its chairman, Mahmoud Ali Youssouf, is reduced to expressing \u201cdeep concern\u201d over the continent\u2019s endless crises \u2014 from wars in Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo to insurgencies across the Sahel \u2014 but with limited scope to act.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt a time when the AU is needed the most, it is arguably at its weakest since it was inaugurated,\u201d said the International Crisis Group (ICG) in a recent report.<\/p>\n
– Ignoring own rules –<\/p>\n
With 10 military coups in Africa since 2020, the AU has been forced to ignore the rule in its charter that coup-leaders must not stand for elections. Gabon and Guinea, suspended after their coups, were reinstated this past year despite breaking that rule.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, there has been no \u201cdeep concern\u201d over a string of elections marred by rigging and extreme violence.<\/p>\n
Youssouf was quick to congratulate Tanzania\u2019s President Samia Suluhu Hassan after she won 98 percent in a vote in October in which all leading opponents were barred or jailed and thousands of protesters were killed by security forces.<\/p>\n
The AU praised the \u201copenness\u201d of an election in Burundi in June described by Human Rights Watch as \u201cdominated by repression (and) censorship.\u201d<\/p>\n
The problem, said Benjamin Auge, of the French Institute of International Relations, is that few African leaders care about how they are viewed abroad as they did in the early days after independence.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are no longer many presidents with pan-African ambitions,\u201d he told AFP.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of the continent\u2019s leaders are only interested in their internal problems. They certainly don\u2019t want the AU to interfere in domestic matters,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
– AU \u2018supports dialogue\u2019 –<\/p>\n
AU representatives point out that its work stretches far beyond conflict, with bodies doing valuable work on health, development, trade and much more.<\/p>\n
Spokesman Nuur Mohamud Sheekh told AFP that its peace efforts went unnoticed because they were measured in conflicts that were prevented.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe AU has helped de-escalate political tensions and support dialogue before situations descend into violence,\u201d he said, citing the work done to prevent war between Sudan and South Sudan over the flashpoint region of Abyei.<\/p>\n
But African states show little interest in building up an organization that might constrain them.<\/p>\n
Power remains instead with the AU Assembly, made up of individual heads of state, including the three longest-ruling non-royals in the world: Teodoro Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea (46 years), Paul Biya of Cameroon (44) and Yoweri Museveni of Uganda (40).<\/p>\n
\u201cThe African Union is weak because its members want it that way,\u201d wrote two academics for The Conversation last year.<\/p>\n
This weekend, the rotating presidency of the AU assembly passes to Burundi\u2019s President Evariste Ndayishimiye, fresh from his party\u2019s 97-percent election victory.<\/p>\n
Coups, conflicts and rights abuses may get discussed, but the main theme is water sanitation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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