Will Africa finally come together?

On Feb. 5 the 12 Annual African Union Summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the Libyan president, Col Gaddafi, introduced his vision of the “United States of Africa” to the African Union.

The proposal calls for all African counties within the Union to use a single currency, passport, and army. Also, the most interesting notion: all 52 African countries would be under one government.

The idea of African unity was first thought of by Halie Selassie I of Ethiopia, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, and Jomo Kenatta of Kenya.

The idea was later brought to the forefront of the continent through the creation of the Organization of African Unity in 1963.

The forefathers of the OAU realized that in unity lies strength. The African Union  has two main agendas. The first is to ensure the decolonization, or political emancipation, of the African continent, and the second is to ensure the economic integration of the continent.

It is only with the achievement of both of these that one can confidently say that the dream of African unity has been realized.

The decolonization of the African continent has been achieved; what is yet to become a reality is economic integration.

But is it asking too much of all 52 countries to “get along”?  Edward Baffoe, an international student at Millersville University and Education Chairperson for the  Millersville University African Student Association, said, “Unity is inevitable.

However, unity should only happen when the relationship between African countries improve.

We have to build the structure from the ground up;  countries within Africa first must focus on domestic issues before attempting to unite the continent.

African unity is a dream worth pursuing, however, problems such as ethnicity, quest for power, amassing of wealth by corrupt leaders, diseases, ethnic conflict, manipulation of data on Africa by African leaders,  rivalry between ruling governments  and international trade conditions are likely to delay this dream. However, unite, we must!