Raila preaches African unity as his AUC bid gathers speed

Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) leader Raila Odinga has called for continental unity as his campaign to clinch the African Union Commission chairmanship (AUC) gathers speed.

Raila was speaking on Monday, August 26, 2024, at the fifth edition of the Festival of African Arts and Culture (FESTAC) that is being held in Kisumu City. The former Premier said that Africa is more united by various aspects that make it a unique continent.

“There is nothing you are going to find here in Kenya that looks weirdly different and unimaginable to a person from Senegal, Zambia, or Egypt.

“In a way, we are unique when it comes to culture. When you go to Asia, there are many different kinds of Eastern cultures. You meet Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese. When you go to Western culture, you meet equally many different cultures: German, British, French, English, and American.

“When it comes to Africa, there is a strong sense of uniformity. Wherever Africans are, however, removed from Mother Africa, they all tend to put the family as the main reference for the individual, and they all tend to agree that society or community is more important than the individual. We are all a product of our group experiences. We all distill our lessons and transmit the distilled knowledge of what is beneficial for our societies to succeeding generations.

“May these traditions never die among the African people. May they unite and not divide us,” Raila noted in his address.

Disunity

The former Lang’ata Member of Parliament (MP), however, noted that the continent remains divided and that there is a need to end that division.

“It is, however, a painful contradiction and a matter of great concern that despite the near uniformity in our beliefs and traditions, Africa is more divided than those societies with multiple cultures. We have never harnessed our music, food, stories, and family connections to deliberately pursue unity and advance our cause as a people.

“We are clinging hard to borders and boundaries that were set up by colonialists and define things that should unite us by countries of origin,” he added.

To Raila, the disunity that Africa is facing is historical, as he talked about how the colonisation process brought about this division.

“It is a pity that over 60 years since most of our countries attained independence, we are still divided and proud to be divided by the languages our colonial masters imposed on us: Anglophones, Francophones, and Lusophones. At a time, the owners of those colonial languages are forging a united Europe. There is no Anglophone or Francophone Europe. But there is Anglophone and Francophone Africa. What pity.

“Africa has to change. Escalated unity is the way to go. The cultural ties that bind us are a great starting point on the path to unity. For historical reasons, Europe is our closest associate around the world. We are not going to engage meaningfully with a unified region when we act as a host of tiny individual nations. Integration is an idea whose time is now,” he added.

The event was also attended by former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo.