The African Union and New Strategies for Development in Africa B ...

Under the AU framework, issues of governance, democracy, rule of law, and constitutionalism have gained expression, even if they are not really actualized. The African Peer Review Mechanism, which is a self-evaluation framework for tracking the progress in the governance sphere, has been instituted as a component of NEPAD.

In the economic integration arena, there is also some continuity in change from the OAU to the AU. Under the OAU, with the support from the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), both the Lagos Plan of Action (LPA) of 1980 and the Final Act of Lagos (FAL) of 1981 were formulated. The FAL called for the establishment of the African Economic Community (AEC). These initiatives emphasized collective self-reliance, a central role for the state in controlling and managing the commanding heights of the economy, and expansion of the market in Africa (Adejumobi, 2003; Agubuzu, 2004). The treaty establishing the AEC was adopted by Africa’s heads of state at the OAU Summit in Abuja, Nigeria, in June 1991, and it was not until 1994 that two-thirds (35) of the OAU-member countries ratified it (Sunmonu, 2004, p. 70). The implementation of the treaty was to be a six-stage process lasting 34 years. Little has been achieved in terms of the AEC agenda, explicating the dynamics of regional and global politics in the economic arena.

The NEPAD initiative, which is the current regional economic development blueprint (though of a different ideological foundation), connects with previous economic agendas on the object of tackling the problems of economic underdevelopment, eradicating poverty, and improving the competitiveness of African economies in global trade. NEPAD’s divergence is on its market orientation and excessive private sector-driven ideology. NEPAD echoes foreign assistance as the locomotive force for economic take-off in Africa, in contradistinction to the previous economic agendas that place a premium on inward-looking strategies. In spite of these, the LPA, FAL, AEC, and NEPAD all exist in the same trajectory, namely, the struggle for Africa’s economic development through a regional development paradigm.