As the EU cracks, Africa is pinning its hopes on a single passport

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/sep/20/eu-cracks-africa-pinning-hopes-single-passport

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Inspired by the example set by the European Union, support for free trade and movement is growing in Africa.

Rwanda and Benin have announced plans to allow visa-free entry, while Zimbabwe has lifted visa restrictions for citizens travelling from within the South Africa Development Community, which includes 15 countries in the region.

In July, the African Union also announced it had finally agreed on an all-Africa passport to finally do away with visa restrictions. Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, the chair of the AU commission, declared it was a “step towards … a strong, prosperous and integrated Africa, driven by its own citizens and capable of taking its rightful place on the world stage.”

Aisha Abdullahi, commissioner for political affairs at the AU, has since said the organisation has recruited consultants who are formulating plans for an African single market, which they hope to implement by 2017.

But while diplomats were promised access to the passports by 2018, it quickly became clear that the continent’s 1.1 billion people would have to wait longer, as the project is reliant on national governments passing individual legislation.

And as in Europe, which after 40 years as a beacon of free trade and movement is showing signs of an existential crisis, migration is proving a contentious issue.

The pan-africanist movement, a cornerstone of the AU, has long called for closer unity on a continent scarred by the arbitrary map-drawing of colonial times, but leaders are worried by what they’ve seen in Europe. Abdullahi said the challenges exposed in the European project have been a warning sign.

“Free movement has many economic and social benefits, but we know that there are concerns,” Abdullahi said. “This is why we are not doing it in a loose fashion, or like European free movement.”

Check out the African Union Diplomatic Passport launched in Kigali yesterday. What do you think of this? #AUPassport pic.twitter.com/PdySClZGup

Takyiwaa Manuk, a director at the Economic Commission for Africa, said the political and social challenges African countries face are more extreme than those in Europe. He stressed that while international media has focused on mass migration from Africa to Europe, 80% of Africans who migrate do so within the continent, with less than 20% travelling to Europe.

This has brought serious problems, most recently with a spate of xenophobic attacks in South Africa, which has the second biggest migrant population on the continent after Ivory Coast. About 300 businesses run by migrants were destroyed, and workers from countries such as Zimbabwe and Mozambique were attacked.

Real unity?

So amid optimistic talk of a “United States of Africa”, critics have been quick to point out that the union has been catastrophically weak in dealing with continental crises and supporting populations under attack.

Though it has deployed peacekeeping forces to Somalia and Darfur, and has recently agreed to send troops to South Sudan, it has been accused of largely ignoring the brutal jihadi occupation in northern Mali, the deadly Ebola outbreak in west Africa, and failing to hold “presidents for life” to account.

This ambiguous approach to democratic principles has led to a situation in which Chad’s president, Idriss Déby, who recently extended his 26-year rule amid accusations of vote rigging, intimidation and holding “the whole country hostage”, is now mediating in an election crisis in Gabon.

Dapo Oyewole, director of the Policy Development Network, said the AU needs to change its image if it is to truly bring about continental unity.

“The African Union needs to become much more active and meaningfully relevant in the day-to-day life of average Africans,” he said. “It has to become an accessible and responsive platform for actualising collective aspirations and not just like a club of African leaders.”

But the new project shows promise says Imad Mesdoua, an Algerian political analyst based in London. “The new inter-African passport is proof that member states are genuine about making integration a reality,” he said, but added “more needs to be done and at a much faster pace.”