Pan-Africanization of Human Security

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<CN> CHAPTER 20
<CH>The Pan-Africanization of Human Security
<CA>Thomas Kwasi Tieku
<A>Introduction
A distinctive characteristic of the African Union (AU) is the emphasis it has placed on
human security, defined as the protection of people and communities, rather than of
states, from violence and imminent danger. No international organization has embellished
its binding agreements, key policy documents, treaties, memoranda of understanding,
plans of action, mission and vision statements, communiqués, conventions, declarations
and decisions with human security ideas more than the AU. Human securitization of AU
appears to be at odds with post-September 11 2001 institutional development which often
prioritized traditional military security issues. Indeed, traditional security seems to have
regained its preeminent position in the post-9-11 international system. Most international
institutions and structures that emerged post-9-11 provided privileged positions to
counterterrorism and military security issues. Traditional security became a priority area
in the assistance program of aid agencies and international organizations such as the
United Nations assumed leadership roles in the promotion of traditional military and
counterterrorism. Yet, the AU, which was inaugurated a few months after September 11
2001 terrorist attacks on the United States of America, kept faith with its human security
approach to continental cooperation and interstate interactions in Africa. So how and
why did human security become a central feature of the African Union? What challenges

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has the Union faced in its effort to make human security the only security doctrine in
town?
The chapter argues that human security ideas entered into the practice of Pan-Africanism
as part of a broader continental, institutional and normative shift in Africa in the early
1990s. The ideational shift was predicated on the idea that traditional understanding of
security has contributed in impoverishing the African continent. A new understanding of
security centered on the individual might help Africa deal with security and economic
predicaments. The Kampala Movement and policy entrepreneurialship of the then
Secretary General of the Organization of African Unity, Salim Ahmed Salim, are largely
credited for undermining the attraction of traditional security ideas among the African
ruling elite and for introducing human security as a persuasive alternative to fill the
intellectual void which emerged. The ideational shift led to the formation of the African
Union as an instrument for the promotion and socialization of human security ideas at the
interstate level. Almost all the decisions, declarations and protocols that African leaders
adopted in the first eight years since the formation of the AU had strong human security
undertones. The AU is, however, facing tremendous challenges in promoting its human
security agenda. The Arab spring, which led to the toppling of two major financers of the
AU, and the support the international community gave to Libyan rebels have turned
human security from a darling idea to almost a taboo subject in the corridors of the AU.
The argument of the article is organized into four sections. The first section sets a context
for the analysis, noting that the formation of the African Union was informed, in part, by

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human security concerns. It is followed by an outline of ideas of human security as they
may be said to exist in the AU, teasing out the human security elements in key AU
documents. The third part of the article examines AU institutions promoting human
security. The fourth section examines challenges the AU faces in its efforts to convince
the African elite that they should accept the human security doctrine as the desirable
norms and guiding principles in their states.
<A>Pan-Africanism in Practice: From the OAU to the AU
African leaders created the AU on May 26, 2001 to reflect a shift in the focus of the Pan-
African project.1 Pan-Africanism as practised within the institutional framework of the
Organization of African Unity (OAU) focused primarily on legitimizing and
institutionalizing statehood in Africa. Protection of states and governing regimes in
Africa became the referent of Pan-Africanism. As part of the efforts to protect and
consolidate the African state, the Charter of the OAU committed African governments to
a treaty that contained some of the strongest clauses that defend and hold together key
elements of juridical sovereignty ever to be embodied in any international organization
(Clapham 1996). The Charter also put in place only institutions, rules and administrative
mechanisms that strengthened sovereign prerogatives and the territorial integrity of
African states. Many institutional restrictions were imposed on the OAU Secretariat to
prevent it from becoming a supranational entity.
The institutionalization of the state across the African continent meant that Pan-
Africanism needed a new focus and meaning. A new generation of Pan-Africanists led by
1 26 May, 2001 is recognized as the official date that the AU came into existence because it was the date
that the Constitutive Act of the African Union entered into force. It was exactly thirty days after the deposit
of the instrument of ratification by two-thirds of the member states of the OAU, as provided for in Article
28 of the CA.

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the eminent South African Nelson Mandela and the shrewd Tanzanian diplomat Salim
Ahmed Salim made conscious efforts in the 1990s to give a new meaning to Pan-
Africanism. They felt that Pan-Africanism needed to deal with challenges facing ordinary
Africans, rather than those encountered by broader entities such as states and regimes
(Mandela 1994; Salim 1990). They identified three main challenges: namely, security
threats, underdevelopment and the impact of international political economic forces
(Salim 1995). These three major issues informed the creation of the AU and the drafting
of its legal text, called the Constitutive Act of the African Union (CA). To provide a
framework for dealing with human insecurity, the CA empowers the Union to prevent,
manage and resolve conflicts on the continent (Powell and Tieku 2005).2 The hope is
that the AU will create conditions in which peace may prevail on the African continent,
to make continental Africa a ‘zone of peace.’ African leaders also felt that regional
economic integration could provide a basis for sustainable development; as a result, the
CA provides the legal and institutional framework for African states to integrate their
economies (African Union 2001). Last, the AU is designed to assist African governments
in managing international issues effectively. As part of the move to enhance Africa’s role
in the international system, in July 2003 in Maputo in Mozambique, African leaders
asked the AU Commission ‘to set up a negotiating team (…) headed by [an] experienced
2 The new security architecture which is managed by a newly created fifteen-member Peace and Security
Council (herein referred to as PSC), calls for the development of a rapid reaction force, an African Standby
Force (ASF), to be fully developed by the year 2010. The ASF will build on the military capabilities of the
regional economic communities in Africa to develop the ASF. Note that the new security regime had
already undertaken its first peacemaking operations called the African Mission in Burundi (AMIB). AMIB
was an integrated mission made up of 3500 contingents drawn mainly from South Africa, Mozambique and
Ethiopia deployed by the AU in April 2003 to monitor a ceasefire in Burundi. On 21 May 2004, the United
Nations Security Council passed a resolution to takeover the mission after AMIB had stabilize and created
conditions conducive for peacekeeping operations. It has also deployed another mission to the Darfur
region of Sudan.

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person to negotiate on behalf of all Member States the fundamental issues that are being
negotiated in the World Trade Organization (WTO)’ (African Union 2003).
These three core areas drive the work of the 17 institutions that make up the AU
(Cilliers 2003). Of those, the key ones are the African Heads of State and Government
(Assembly), the Executive Council, the Permanent Representative Committee, the Pan-
African Parliament (PAP), AU Commission, Peace and Security Council, the Pan-
African Court of Justice, the Economic, Social and Cultural Councils (ECOSOC), the
African Central Bank, the Investment Bank and the Monetary Fund. In theory, the
Assembly provides policy directions, including the human security agenda for the Union.
In practice, though, the AU Commission and the Peace and Security Council have taken
the centre stage in shaping the AU human security agenda. The AU human security
objectives entail creating conditions for individuals to satisfy their basic needs. These
include, first, working to provide the social, economic, political, environmental and
cultural conditions necessary for the survival and dignity of the individual; second,
striving to create conditions for the protection of and respect for human rights and good
governance; and third, trying to guarantee for each individual the opportunity to fulfil
his/her full development (African Union 2005a). This understanding of human security
informs the AU’s work in the areas of peace, security, political governance and economic
development.
<A>AU Human Security Agenda
The AU human security agenda in the areas of peace and security is clearly expressed in
Article 4(h) of the Constitutive Act of the African Union. Article 4(h), which empowers
the Union to intervene in the affairs of a member state in order to ‘prevent war crimes,

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genocide and crimes against humanity,’ was inserted into the CA, as a number of
informed writers on the CA have eloquently argued, with a view to protecting ordinary
people in Africa from abusive governments (Malan 2002; Cilliers and Sturman 2002;
Kioko 2003).3 To provide an operational arm to this specific human security element, the
AU made room for the creation of an African Standby Force charged with the task of
intervening militarily in states for humanitarian purposes (African Union 2001). The
condition laid down for human security intervention under the AU ‘goes “beyond” the
provision made for intervention in the internal affairs of a country in the UN Charter’
(Schoeman 2003). The CA has actually set lower thresholds for intervention than those
outlined in any international legal code (Weiss 2004). The specification of war crimes,
genocide, and crimes against humanity by the drafters of the CA as grounds for
intervention has provided a clearer set of criteria for the Union to intervene in a state for
human security purposes. The AU, unlike other international organizations, does not
necessarily require the consent of a state to intervene in its internal affairs in situations
where populations are at risk. That is, the OAU’s system of complete consensus has been
abandoned. Under the AU, a decision on the part of a two-thirds majority of the
Assembly is required for intervention purposes (Powell and Tieku 2005). The AU used
the two-thirds majority principle to arrive at the decision to deploy a peacekeeping force
to monitor a ceasefire in Burundi in April 2003. The Assembly also used the principle to
decide on the mission to the Darfur region of Sudan in the summer of 2004. The AU also
approaches economic development from a human security perspective. The development
agenda in articles 3 and 4 of the CA is intended to create conditions necessary for
3 The article has been amended to include intervention to “restore peace and stability” and in response to ‘a
serious threat to legitimate order.”

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sustainable development to take place. As part of the sustainable development agenda,
the AU commits its Member States to ensuring balanced economic development, to
promoting gender equality and good health, and to working towards eradicating
preventable diseases (Articles 3 (j) and (n); 4(l) and (n)).
The AU has adopted an approach to political governance in Africa that is human
security-centred inasmuch as the CA commits Member States of the AU to promoting
‘respect for the sanctity of human life’ (Article 4(o)). Article 4(i), moreover, makes it
clear that African people have a ‘right to live in peace.’ Article 3(h) of the CA, therefore,
commits Member States to a path where they will ‘promote and protect human and
peoples’ rights in accordance with the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights
and other relevant human rights instruments.’ It is also significant that 3(g) enjoins
member governments to promote democratic principles and institutions, popular
participation and good governance. This provision in the CA is important for the AU
human security agenda, because it is generally understood in the human security research
community that democratic development is a critical aspect of human security
(Hammerstad 2005). The decision to exclude from the AU states whose governments
came to power through unconstitutional means therefore advances the human security
agenda. The strength of the human security ideas embedded in the CA begs the question
of how and why these human security doctrines entered into the discourse, agenda,
documents and programs of the AU.

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<A>Pan-Africanism and Human Security
Human security entered into the discourse of Pan-Africanism in the early 1990s. It was
initiated by the Kampala Movement and Salim Ahmed Salim (Deng and Zartman 2002).
The Kampala Movement was an initiative of civil society groups that met in Kampala in
Uganda in the early 1990s to develop a regime of principles regarding security, stability,
development and cooperation for Africa. At the heart of the principles, widely known as
the CSSDCA, was a conscious effort to redefine security and sovereignty, and to
demand certain ‘standards of behaviour ... from every government [in Africa] in the
interest of common humanity’ (Obasanjo and Mosha 1992, p.260). The Movement
demanded that African leaders redefine their states’ security as a multi-dimensional
phenomenon going beyond military considerations to include economic, political
and social aspects of the individual, the family and the society. In the view of the
movement, ‘[t]he concept of security must embrace all aspects of society . . . [and
the] security of a nation must be based on the security of the life of the individual
citizens to live in peace and to satisfy basic needs’ (Obasanjo and Mosha 1992,
p.265).
On security, the CSSDCA package aimed at influencing African leaders to treat
security as both a human security issue and an interdependent phenomenon.4 As a human
security issue, it proposed that ‘[t]he concept of security must embrace all aspects of
society . . . [and that the] security of a nation must be based on the security of the life of
the individual citizens to live in peace and to satisfy basic needs’ (AHG/Decl.4
(XXXVI)). As an interdependent phenomenon, it urged African leaders to see the
4 This section draws on Tieku (2004).

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security of their states ‘as inseparably linked to that of other African countries’. This not
only implies that the maintenance of security anywhere in Africa is a collective
responsibility of all African states, but also suggests that sovereignty no longer offers the
protection behind which African leaders can conceal abuse of their citizens.
On stability, the CSSDCA set the criteria for judging the solidity of African
states, suggesting that it should be grounded in liberal principles, such as respect for the
rule of law, human rights, good governance and the participation of African citizens in
public affairs. On co-operation and development, the package did not contain anything
distinctly different from previous proposals submitted to the OAU. The majority of issues
discussed under the co-operation and development sections essentially reiterated the
traditional rhetorical Pan-African ideals, such as African solutions for African problems
and the importance of integration for Africa’s development, among others.
The emphasis the reforms laid on the effective participation of civil society in co-
operation and development programmes brings to Pan-Africanism an essential missing
link. Indeed, the CSSDCA urged African leaders not only to involve regional and
grassroots civil society organizations in the continental decision-making process, but also
to allow nongovernmental groups to act as the main engine for dealing with security,
stability, development and co-operation issues. In addition, they established a clear
relationship between development and co-operation and also declared that the ‘security,
stability and development of every African country is [sic] inseparably linked’ to that of
other African states (Africa Union 2002). This meant that successful management of
security, stability and development requires a continental approach. The CSSDCA called

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on African leaders to develop ‘a common African agenda based on a unity of purpose’ to
confront Africa’s security, stability and development challenges (Africa Union 2002:27).
The human security document was submitted to African leaders for
integration into the OAU framework in early 1991. The OAU convened a meeting of
African governments to discuss it in May 1991 in Kampala in Uganda. The leaders
who attended agreed in principle in the Kampala Declaration to explore the
possibility of integrating the ideas into the OAU in another meeting in June 1991 in
Abuja in Nigeria. The CSSDCA was not adopted during the Abuja summit because of
opposition by Libya’s Muammar Ghaddafi, Sudan’s Omar Hassan Ahmed el-Bashir
and Kenya’s Daniel Arap Moi (Deng and Zartman 2002). The leaders suspended
discussions on the document and, indeed, on human security indefinitely.
Although the OAU leadership rejected the CSSDCA, the Kampala initiative
provided the platform for Salim Ahmed Salim to place human protection on the
OAU’s agenda. The specific elements of the human protection agenda formed part of a
broader policy initiative articulated in a document called The Political and Socio-
Economic Situation in Africa and the Fundamental Changes Taking Place in the World,
which the Assembly of the OAU adopted as a Declaration on July 11, 1990 (Salim 1990).
The Declaration recognized that the end of the Cold War had fundamentally changed the
geopolitics of the world, and that African governments needed to adopt specific measures
to adapt to the new world order. It further argued that African states would henceforth
have to do things on their own; there would be no geo-strategic basis for outside powers
to protect Africans. It therefore called on the leaders to revive indigenous continental
protection initiatives. More specifically, the Declaration urged the OAU leadership to

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develop a framework for preventing, managing and resolving conflicts, since there would
be no rationale for the international community to keep peace and promote human rights
in Africa in the post-Cold War era.
The Declaration opened the space for Salim, during the OAU summit in July 1991
in Abuja in Nigeria, to propose to the Assembly a framework to create a mechanism for
the OAU to prevent, manage and resolve conflicts in Africa. The mechanism was not just
for the order-maintaining purposes that many writers tend to emphasize; it had a broader
goal of protecting ordinary Africans from imminent danger. The Assembly adopted the
mechanism in principle, and instructed the OAU Secretariat to hold consultations with
Member States and to revise the proposal to reflect ‘the views, comments and proposals
of Member States’ (AHG/Decl. 1 XXVIII). A much watered-down version of the
mechanism was adopted by the Assembly in Cairo, Egypt in June 1993 (Ibok 1999).
Some governments in Africa, in particular the governments of Daniel Arap Moi of
Kenya and Lansana Conté of Guinea, ensured that the provisions in the draft
framework that placed emphasis on human protection and proposed the delegation
of powers to the OAU Secretariat to protect ordinary Africans from state abuse were
removed. The extensive revisions of the draft framework by African governments
largely explain why the mechanism that was approved during the OAU summit in
Cairo in June 1993 adopted a traditional security approach. Nevertheless, Salim’s
initiative set in motion serious discussions within the OAU leadership on the need
for the OAU to play a central role in protecting ordinary Africans from imminent
threats.

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The former South African President, Nelson Mandela, pushed further the human
security discussions on June 13, 1994 when he asked African leaders to empower the
OAU to protect African people and to prevent African governments from abusing the
sovereignty of states (Mandela 1994). The call emboldened the OAU Secretariat to
initiate a series of reform processes between 1995 and 1998 that were aimed at
structuring the OAU in order to make it focus on human security concerns (Salim 1995,
1997). It also, in 1998, encouraged the Secretariat to submit, and the Assembly to adopt,
two key human security issues. The first sought to make the promotion of ‘strong and
democratic institutions’ a key objective of the OAU (AHG/Decl. XXXV). The second
excluded from the OAU states ‘whose Governments came to power through
unconstitutional means,’ and the third gave the OAU the mandate to assist military
regimes that may exist on the African continent in moving towards a democratic system
of government. The election of Olusegun Obasanjo, who was a key figure in the
Kampala Movement, as president of Nigeria encouraged the OAU Secretariat to
embellish OAU documents and policies with human security doctrines. Obasanjo himself
made it a top priority to set in motion the process of integrating the CSSDCA into the
OAU (Deng and Zartman 2002, p. xv).
The decision to create the AU in September 1999 provided a good opportunity for
the Nigerian and the South African governments to support the OAU Secretariat in
merging human security doctrines with Pan-African ideas. The strategy adopted by the
Secretariat aimed to encourage the delegations that negotiated the legal treaty of the AU
to codify as principles of the AU some of the ideas in the CSSDCA while simultaneously
working with African leaders to ensure the adoption of the CSSDCA as a working

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document of the AU. The then Assistant Secretary General in Charge of Political Affairs,
Said Djinnit, and the Acting Legal Counsellor of the OAU, Ben Kioko, played
instrumental roles in making the delegations adopt the human security ideas found in
Articles 3 and 4 of the CA and that were discussed in the previous sections of this article.
As a step towards making African leaders adopt the CSSDCA, the Secretariat, with the
strong backing of the Nigerian government, conveyed a ministerial meeting in May 2000
to discuss ways to integrate the CSSDCA into the AU/OAU. The Report of the
ministerial meeting that was prepared by the Secretariat was approved by the OAU
summit in Lomé in July 2000. African leaders agreed to use the CSSDCA as norms and
guiding principles of security, stability, development and cooperation in a Memorandum
of Understanding in July 2002 in Pretoria in South Africa. Though the Memorandum of
Understanding added many traditional security concerns to the CSSDCA, it retained most
of the human security principles.
<A>Institutional Mechanisms for Promoting Human Security
The Memorandum of Understanding paved the way for the Secretariat to create a unit
within the OAU to coordinate CSSDCA activities. The CSSDCA unit is now called the
African Citizens’ Directorate (CIDO). More crucially, it opened the space for the AU
Commission to try to institutionalize human security ideas in Africa, which it is doing
through civil society channels. The CIDO is building coalitions around, and engineering
consensus on, human security within the civil society groups. The office of the Chair
Person of the AU Commission, the Political Department, the Peace and Security
Department and the Legal Affairs Department are also using state channels, such as the

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Assembly of Heads of State and Government, the Council of Ministers and the
Permanent Representative Committee, to convince the African ruling elite to accept
human security doctrines.
<B>The African Citizens’ Directorate (CIDO)
The CIDO was originally established in 2001 as the implementation directorate of the
CSSDCA. The Nigerian government, which provided the resources for the creation of the
directorate, wanted the unit to focus primarily on integrating the CSSDCA ideas into all
documents of the AU. The AU Commission gave the CIDO the additional responsibility
of facilitating civil society engagement with the AU. As part of its efforts to engage civil
society with the AU organs and process, in 2001 the CIDO developed an annual
conference of indigenous African civil society and the AU. The CIDO usually invites
over 50 civil society groups in Africa to attend these conferences, which are normally
held prior to AU summits. About five conferences have been held since the first AU-
civil society meeting was held in June 2001. The conferences have turned out to be a
good place for the AU Commission to sell AU programs, projects and agendas to civil
society groups. The CIDO is using the conferences to create awareness about AU’s work
and persuade the civil society groups to integrate AU’s policies, including the human
security agenda, into their advocacy activities and promote them in their states. Because
the CIDO was established to promote CSSDCA and the AU human security agenda, the
discussions of all past AU-civil society conferences have been dominated by human
security issues. The head of the CIDO, Jimmi Adisa, has taken full advantage of the AU-
civil society conference to create awareness and update civil society groups about the

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CSSDCA and AU human security activities. The CIDO is also promoting the human
security agenda in the intellectual and diaspora communities. The head of CIDO has
taken advantage of the CIDO civil society mandate to sell the human security agenda at
two big conferences to selected African intellectuals and Africans in the diaspora. The
first conference was held in October 2004 in Senegal, and the second was held in July
2006 in Brazil.
<A>Challenges to AU Human Security Promotion
AU human security agenda is impressive on paper but many of the ideas the AU seeks to
implement are abstract in nature, difficult to operationalize and even harder to implement.
One of the distinctive markers of AU human security agenda is the acceptance of the idea
that an African state can claim to have security not only when individual citizens live in
peace but also when their basic needs are satisfied. The concept of peace is not only
loaded but it is a tall order for African states, such as Democratic Republic of Congo
where banditry, rape, and lawlessness appear to be widespread and Somalia which is
often used as a classic case to illustrate failed state thesis in mainstream scholarship, to
even aspire to achieve negative peace. It will at the minimum require disbarment,
demobilization and integration of former combatants into mainstream society. But as
well-equipped international organizations such as the United Nations and North Atlantic
Treaty Organization (NATO) have found out in places like Burundi, Cote d’Ivoire, Sierra
Leone and Afghanistan, DRR ‘is a complex process … and many DDR programmes stall
or are only partly implemented’ (UN 2009). Indeed, NATO had difficulty implementing
the DDR mandate in the Afghanistan mission.

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The AU human security agenda revolves around the practice of rule of law,
respect for human and consolidation of democracies in African societies. But as Hawkins
(2009) tells us, the definitions of these concepts are “not entirely open ended” and they
mean different things to different people. Certainly Libya, Egypt and Algeria—three of
the five countries who contribute 75% to AU’s operational budget—do not share AU’s
interpretation of these concepts. The Algerian President in particular has often warned
African leaders to take a cautious approach, arguing that sovereignty is the last frontier
and the only protection Africans have in a highly unequal and selfish world.5 While
Algeria has not been able to prevent the AU Commission from inserting human security
ideas in almost every AU document, it is hard to see where the AU Commission will get
the money to translate them into concrete actions. Libyan and Egyptian new leaders have
shown little interest in human security ideas and South Africa and Nigeria interests in
human security have gone down since Presidents Obansajo and Mbeki left office. Most
keen observers of AU politics do not expect current governments of South Africa and
Nigeria to stand firmly behind the human security principles embedded in AU should
Algeria government purge future AU documents of any human security pretensions.
There are strong indications that future AU documents will contain little human security
ideas. The ultra conservative AU’s Permanent Representative Council (PRC), composed
of Ambassadors from AU member states, has repositioned itself as the vanguard of
traditional realist understanding of security following the just ended NATO’s military
5 President Boutifleka of Algeria used the phrase “the last frontier.” Quoted in Adonia Ayebare, “Regional
Perspectives on Sovereignty and Intervention,” Discussion Paper of ICISS Round Table Consultation,
Maputo, 10 March 2001.Available online at http://web.gc.cuny.edu/icissresearch/maputu.htm. Accessed on
2 March 2004.

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campaign in Libya. The PRC members will use the gate keeping powers they have to
prevent any human security oriented document from going through.
Some member states of the AU are also unhappy about the space the CIDO has
opened for civil society to participate in AU activities. The states that opposed the
integration of the CSSDCA into the OAU in the early 1990s remain uncomfortable with
the human security agenda. It is perhaps the case that these leaders are opposed to
AU’s promotion of human security doctrines because it renders their regimes
vulnerable. They have however succeeded in creating the impression in AU
leadership circles that the human security and the CSSDCA process are nothing but
vehicles for promoting Western values in Africa. A number of African leaders such
President Bashir seem to think that the introduction of human security language and
doctrines into the work and documents of the AU is a conscious effort by Western
governments and institutions to use the AU as an instrument to pursue their cultural
colonialism project.
The anti-human security leaders in the AU leadership have asserted their
influence primarily because the unwavering support human security enjoyed in the
Assembly of the AU during the early days of the AU has waned considerably. Strong
supporters of the CSSDCA, such as Obasanjo and Mbeki are no longer in power and their
successors are less keen on human security. The ambivalent attitude of the supporters of
human security has allowed the anti-human security leaders in the Assembly to move to
curb its influence in recent AU documents. For instance, the African Union Non-
Aggression and Defence Pact which was recently developed took a minimalist human
security approach. Compared with the original draft of the Common African Defence and

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Security Policy that was developed in the early days of the AU, this follow-up document
(i.e. the African Union Non-Aggression and Defence Pact) paid human security scant
heed. The minimalist human security orientations of recent policy documents of the AU
attest to the increasing influence of the anti-human security elements in the AU
leadership. The increasing visibility of the anti- CSSDCA elements in the AU leadership
raises the question: does human security have a future within the AU?
In addition, the CIDO human security promotion through civil society groups is
also facing serious problems. The anti-human security governments in Africa are
undermining CIDO’s ability to meet with civil society groups. These governments
usually do not cooperate with the CIDO to convene the AU-civil society conferences
when they host the AU summits. The Libyan and the Sudanese governments failed to
give the CIDO the necessary logistical and political support to convene AU-civil society
conference prior to the summits in Sirte in June 2005 and in Khartoum in January 2006.
The AU-civil society conferences have also come under attack. Some of the big
Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) operating in Africa have started to question
their relevance. They are unhappy with the CIDO’s engagements with African civil
society, and claim that the civil society groups invited to these conferences are neither
representative of civil society organizations in Africa nor given the opportunity to
contribute to the work of the AU. A recent report by some of the NGOs sums up their
concerns:
[T]he quality of the debate [during AU-civil society conferences] is often
poor, with a lack of substance, and there are some concerns that the forums
are rather used to endorse decisions that have already been taken than to

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provide a real opportunity for civil society organisations to influence
decision-making at the summit… In addition, the criteria applied by CIDO in
selecting participants to attend forums are not clear; many of those who are
invited are quite closely connected to governments, and there have been
cases where self-funded participants have been excluded from the meetings,
even though they would appear to fulfill the qualifications to attend
(AfriMAP, AFRODAD, Oxfam 2007).
The paucity of opportunities civil society gets to shape AU agenda may discourage civil
society groups from adding AU human security initiatives to their work.
The CIDO unit itself is seriously understaffed. Besides Jimmi Adisa, the head,
there is only one person working full-time. It is also poorly equipped. The institutional
capacity of CIDO is weak in part because it was envisioned to be a mere coordinating
unit. The Department for Political Affairs (PDA) and Department for Peace and Security
(DPS) were supposed to manage major aspects of human security projects. But both
institutions have serious capacity deficiencies. The current structure of the AU
Commission allows the PDA to recruit nine full-time professionals of which five are
required to work on issues relating to democracy, governance, human rights, elections
issues and the other four have responsibilities over humanitarian, refugee and internally
displaced affairs. As of the time of writing, three of the nine were not at post and none of
the six professionals who have been recruited are experts on human security. The DPS is
relatively well equipped as its staff complement is three times that of the PDA. The
problem is that the department has been suffering from high turnovers as many of its
most competent officials continue to be poached by other international organizations such

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as the UN. The DPS in particular and the AU in general have become training grounds
for the UN. The lure of bigger pay and less work made some of the ardent Pan-
Africanists and senior professional staff at the DPS abandon the AU for the UN.6 It has
become an open secret that many people in the AU aspire to move to a more lucrative
even if lowered-ranked position in the UN. The other problem with both departments is
that they are generally perceived as elitist institutions whose activities are often
inaccessible to civil society groups.
Both departments have serious financial challenges with the DPA in the more
difficult position. The DPA’s activities are funded mainly through the extremely
unreliable annual contributions made by AU member states. African governments have
carried the terrible habit of serially defaulting in the payment of annual contributions.
While the situation is not as bad as the OAU era, there are far too many governments in
Africa who are just happy to free ride. On average, less than 50% of statutory
contributions are paid on time every year. Even in better times such as in 2005, the AU is
only able to collect just 57%, representing US$36 million out of US$63 million of
assessed contributions. This money was supposed to cover the 2005 budget of around
US$158 million, representing US$63 million for operations and US$95 million for
programmes. The statutory contributions paid in that year could not even cover the
US$63 million operating budget. The AU sought to change the situation in 2005 by
developing new funding formulae which has made five African States—Algeria, Egypt,
Libya, Nigeria and South Africa—contribute 75% to AU’s operational budget. But as
AU Commissioner for Economic Affairs, Maxwell Mkwezalamba, observed in 2006, the
6 Prominent DPS figures who moved from AU to UN included former Commissioner for Peace and
Security and one time the number two person in the Pan-African organization Said Djinit, former head of
Conflict Management Division Sam Ibok, and former information analyst Musifiky Mwanasali.

21
new funding formula is unsustainable (Maxwell Mkwezalamba 2006). The shift to
“ability- to- pay system” has moved AU from the realm of solidarity politics, a core value
and a unique feature of Pan-Africanism, to the area of realpolitic. There is a fear that the
five states will use their financial contribution to control the AU similar to the way the
permanent members of the Security Council control the UN system. The current leaders
of the five paymaster generals of the AU are at best indifferent to human security and at
worst hostile. While the new Libya and Egyptian leaders have not shown any interest in
AU human security agenda, Algeria, Nigeria and South Africa consider human security
or protection of civilians as a new regime change language. The NATO bombings of
Libya have turned human security from a darling idea to a taboo subject in the corridors
of AU.
<A>Conclusion
This paper sought to show that the AU has taken a centre stage in the promotion of
human security in Africa. The AU drew on the work of the civil society movement in the
early 1990s to develop a Pan-African version of human security that comprises principles
of security, stability, development and cooperation in Africa. This conceptualization of
human security is meant not only to give a new perspective on the doctrines; it provides
creative ways of making the concept acceptable in Africa. Member States of the AU
approved the CSSDCA in 2000 in Lome, Togo, and the OAU Secretariat and the AU
Commission made serious efforts to integrate it into the work of the AU. Institutions of
the AU Commission, such as the Peace and Security Department and the Political and
Legal Affairs Departments, have translated the doctrines into AU documents and work.

22
They have used the insights of the CSSDCA to enrich AU binding agreements, key
policy documents, treaties, memoranda of understanding, plans of action, mission and
vision statements, communiqués, conventions, declarations and decisions. Almost all
decisions, declarations and protocols that the leadership of the Union adopted after the
formation of the AU have some element of human security.
The integration of human security doctrines into AU binding agreements and
other documents is significant in part because legalization at the continental level is one
of the most important components of institutionalization of ideas and doctrines and in
part because it provides a basis for the incorporation of the doctrines into national laws
and policies. It also strengthens the hands of organizations and actors promoting human
security in African states to influence their governments to pursue human security
policies. Legalization of the doctrines would at least make African governments careful
in using these human security ideas for rhetorical purposes only.
The AU has moved to persuade the African elite to adopt human security as a
guiding principle. The AU Commission has mandated the African Citizens’ Directorate
to pursue the socialization and institutionalization processes. The African Citizens’
Directorate is doing this by creating awareness among civil society groups about the AU
human security agenda and activities. The hope is that the civil society groups will
integrate the AU human security work into their advocacy activities and then promote it
in their states. The African Citizens’ Directorate has encountered serious challenges in its
efforts to institutionalize human security. A number of African governments are
undermining CIDO’s work, tacitly undercutting its ability to meet with civil society
groups. The CIDO also faces serious institutional and human resource challenges. It is

23
understaffed and under-resourced. There is also the real danger that the entire human
security agenda is going off the radar screen of the AU. The Arab Spring has toppled
major financiers of the AU. The new Libyan and Egyptian leaders have not shown any
interest in AU human security agenda, and Algerian, Nigerian and South African
governments consider human security or protection of civilian as a new regime change
language. Indeed, the NATO bombings of Libya seem to have taken away any apatite AU
political leaders had for promoting human security at the state level.
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