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THE ROAD TO AFRICA UNION; RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT

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THE ROAD TO AFRICA UNION; RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

 

Background of Study

Africa is a mosaic of peoples, cultures, ecological settings and history. The continent has an area of 11,677,240 square miles (30,244,050 square Kilometers), stretching from the Mediterranean in the north to the meeting point of the Atlantic and Indian oceans in the south (Chazan 1999: 5). It has the highest arable land per capita in the world; its landmass of 2.1 million hectars with 32% of forest and woodland and 6.2% arable land is twice its share of world population (Mosha 1981) Africa has a population of some 730 million (roughly 10 percent of the world’s population) who speak more than eight hundred languages. Seventy percent of the population lives in the rural areas who earn their living either through farming or animal rearing (Chazan 1999: 5). Africa is also rich in minerals and other resources. It has one quarter of the world’s hydroelectric power and only 3% is presently utilized. The continent contains the largest reserves of metallic ores (top producer of cobalt and nickel), non-ferrous base metals (top producer of copper, lead and zinc); precious metals (top producer of gold and diamond) and non-metallic deposits (a leading producer of phosphates) (Mosha 1998).

Africa’s international contact in the 16th century and afterwards, was to its disadvantage. European merchants shipped millions of Africans, to work on their plantations in the Americas. In the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade, more than 30 million Africans were transported to America from 1500 to 1890, leaving the continent with out young cultivators.

The trade distorted the already booming economic and cultural civilizations. While Europe and America were prospering through industrialization, Africa failed in an exploitative and unproductive system and relation of trade. The trade also created psychological inferiority on the part of Africans.

Following the deterioration of the importance of slavery in the economy, Europeans began to colonize Africa, which culminated at the Berlin conference of 1884-1885. The impact of colonialism was again severe on Africa, a continent that was still under the debacle of slave trade.

In the social dimension, they disrupted accustomed ways of earning a livelihood. In the name of Christianity, the colonizers dismantled African customs, and obsessed in perpetuating white domination. In the name of education, they taught their civilization and history, with little regard for African civilization.

In the economic aspect, colonialism adversely affected production, distribution and consumption. Africans became producers of raw materials for the industries of Europe. They produced cash crops such as palm oil, rubber and cotton, and minerals like copper and gold by ignoring the production of subsistence (consumer) goods.

 

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THE ROAD TO AFRICA UNION; RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT

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