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The United States is seeking to build a stronger partnership with Africa. Pictured is President Joe Biden. Photo: Getty Images
- The US has invited African countries it shares diplomatic relations with to a summit next week.
- The Africa Growth and Opportunities Act will be discussed.
- Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its impact on food security will also be looked into.
The United States will seek to build a stronger partnership with Africa at the US-Africa Leaders Summit in Washington next week.
Forty-nine governments, the African Union Commission, civil society, businesses in the private sector and young leaders are expected to attend the summit from 13 to 15 December.
Representatives from the US State Department’s Bureau of African Affairs told a select group of African journalists that numerous pressing global issues would be discussed, such as democracy and governance, security, trade and investment, development, the Covid-19 pandemic, climate change, and the negative effects of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Not invited
Mali, Sudan, Guinea, Burkina Faso, Somaliland and Eritrea were not invited to the summit.
Assistant secretary Molly Phee said: “Out of respect for the African Union, we did not invite governments that have been suspended by the African Union for coups.”
However, she said the US would engage with them through other means.
“We continue to work separately with those countries to encourage a return to a democratic transition, to move to a democratic track, so we’re in a better position to have a strong partnership with those countries,” she added.
Eritrea and Somaliland were excluded because the US does not have any diplomatic ties with those countries.
“We also did not invite countries where we don’t have diplomatic relations, such as Eritrea,” said Judd Devermont, the National Security Council’s Director for African Affairs.
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Unlike last year, Zimbabwe was invited. Foreign affairs minister Frederick Shava, a former envoy to the UN, will attend.
Relations between Zimbabwe and the US have been, and continue to be, frosty two decades on.
Devermont said: “Inviting countries that we have disagreements with is part and parcel of what we think diplomacy is, talking to people that you have disagreements with, being able to raise it in a respectful, candid, and open way.”
The Africa Growth and Opportunities Act
The Africa Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA) is an American policy that seeks to help sub-Saharan Africa economies grow through relations with the US.
Widely seen as a trade failure and a policy that needs a relook, it is one area of relations Africa will want addressed at the summit especially since it will come to an end in 2025.
Phee said AGOA would form part of a robust discussion.
“We regret that AGOA trade preferences have not been utilised to the maximum. We think it’s important to improve our trade with Africa. So that’ll be part of the discussion.
“We’ll also need to consider whether or not that programme is continued in its current form? Is it modified in some way? And a third element we want to look at is how we can do better to engage with the sort of nascent African Continental Free Trade Area.
“Are there ways that we can use AGOA to support the development of the free trade area, which holds so much promise for the continent?”
Coups in Africa
The major themes of the summit centre around democracy, governance and security.
Coups in west Africa have dominated this year’s discourse at AU and UN levels.
“We recognise that if we are going to return to durable, civilian-led transition, it’s going to take a lot of investment on our part – in partnership with regional bodies like ECOWAS (the Economic Community of West African States) and the African Union, with civil society, with institutions.
“And so at the summit, we are going to talk about the ways in which we can do more to make sure that countries are democratic, which, by the way, is an aspiration in Agenda 2063, and we know that the demand for democracy in Africa is high – perhaps higher than any other region: nearly 70 percent,” said Devermont.
Russia
Phee said the US was a “good partner to have” because “we are a global force and we can be a strong voice.”
She said the invasion of Ukraine created problems such as food insecurity for African economies, which were already reeling from the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and climate change.
Therefore, Phee said, she would want to see “that Africans go home feeling that their partnership with the United States makes a concrete difference in the daily lives of African people in terms of health, in terms of security, in terms of food security, and in terms of increased trade and investment.”
The News24 Africa Desk is supported by the Hanns Seidel Foundation. The stories produced through the Africa Desk and the opinions and statements that may be contained herein do not reflect those of the Hanns Seidel Foundation.
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