WhatsApp Image 2024-12-17 at 06.33.28

Turkey’s mediation between Ethiopia and Somalia, while seemingly constructive, is not a positive development for Africa. It exposes a worrying failure by African leaders to manage the continent’s own affairs and determine its future. This scenario highlights the negligence of Africa’s current leadership and reflects poorly on the continent, casting a negative image of Black people worldwide.

It’s not just Turkey—nations like the UAE (United Arab Emirates), Saudi Arabia, and the usual meddler imperialist foreign players such as the U.S. and Europe have been given almost unfettered access to meddle in Africa’s internal matters, going so far as to reshape its social and political fabric.

This approach further risks inviting instability on the continent, because as we have seen, the same Turkey pretending to mediate peace has been supporting terrorists in Syria together with the United States and Israel, they could use the same guise to spread instability on the continent in their quest for access to African resources with justification that they have played a role before in mediating conflicts on the continent.

The reliance on foreign mediation, particularly from countries that are not even global superpowers, signals an even deeper problem: the destruction of Africa’s capabilities and undermining of institutional building on the continent by these unwanted foreigners. It is not as if Africa needs outside powers in its affairs, but rather because such involvement opens the floodgates for further intrusion, eroding the continent’s sovereignty and compromising its destiny.

It’s as though Africa is being perceived as incapable of solving its own problems. Yet, we have previously seen the success of the African Union in resolving the Ethiopian civil conflict in Tigray. The active role played by Former African leaders, elders, and civil society in these negotiations must be further reinforced, and foreign forces kept out, as was successfully done when the U.S. and Europe were excluded from the AU-led talks between the Ethiopian government and the Tigray rebels.

This situation sets a troubling precedent and signals the ongoing failure of African leadership to assert full control over the continent’s affairs, which approach must be rejected and those perpetuating this insubordination of the continent before the rest of the world expunged from power.

Africa’s future must be shaped by Africans ourselves. It is this core principle of sovereignty, a foundational tenet of the African Continental Unity Party (ACUP) that the rest must be built. It is upon this foundation that initiatives like a Continental Railway Platform, an integrated communications system, and robust energy networks will be built—driving industrialization and Africa’s long-awaited economic transformation within our generation.

—Kwame Gonza
Rotating Chairperson, African Continental Unity Party (ACUP)

About The Author

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *