The Addis AU Summit in two acts

At the APR Forum, Uganda, as one of seven countries that completed the Africa Peer Review process last year alongside Benin, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Mali, Mozambique, Lesotho, presented its APRM report.

It earned praise for its handling of electoral petitions and its decentralisation process was touted as increasing opportunity for public participation.

We cannot also ignore the drama that ensued at the opening ceremony of the Summit on January 31, when Libyan President Muammar Gaddafi made a bid to get a one-year extension to his term as the AU chair.

President Gaddafi also asked a representative of the Forum of Traditional Kings, Sultans, Chiefs and Princes — an organisation he created from scratch — to deliver an unscheduled speech.

According to a press report, “The representative, whose name was not given, decked out in gold necklaces and carrying a sceptre, provoked some laughter and an equal amount of embarrassment as he went up onto the podium.

Comparing President Gaddafi to the prophets of the Bible and the Koran, he openly exhorted the heads of state to ‘follow the guide who is showing us the way,’ saying that he had the backing of all the peoples of Africa.”

This little piece of melodrama was unsuccessful, however, and Gaddafi went on to hand over the AU chairmanship to Malawi’s President Bingu wa Mutharika.

His parting shot? “The AU chairperson doesn’t have any prerogative actually,” he said, vowing nevertheless to work for the continent and the institution and continue pushing for his dream of achieving the “United States of Africa”.

While President Gaddafi’s exit marked the departure of the most strident advocate for the immediate integration of Africa, this particular debate predates even his own ascension to power in Libya in 1969.

The two competing schools of thought on how African integration should proceed — immediately and speedily as proposed by Kwame Nkrumah, for which he wanted the OAU’s 1965 Accra Summit to discuss a Union Government for Africa — or step-by-step as suggested by Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere, have sharply divided pan-African politics.

This debate may slow down with Gaddafi’s departure but will certainly not die.

With global geo-politics constantly and cyclically experiencing tentative integrations and treacherous disintegrations, the dream of a United Africa remains fully embedded.

Mugambi Kiai is programme manager in Kenya for the Open Society Initiative for East Africa and also for the Africa Governance Monitoring and Advocacy Project