the statement below is wrong in the sense of claiming that the NSOA just
calls for immediate passage of the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act,
while in fact the delegates had a lot of conditions and concerns around
this legislation
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 16:57:34 -0000
From: "Pritchett, John LCDR PRITCHEJ" <[log in to unmask]>
Reply-To: [log in to unmask]
To: "[log in to unmask]" <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: [us-afr-network] National Summit on Africa Action Plan Charts Course
for Future
Interesting article on the NSA from the State Department's International
Information Program.
29 February 2000 National Summit on Africa Action Plan Charts Course for
Future (239 recommendations aim to raise profile of Africa in U.S.) (930)
By Jim Fisher-Thompson Washington File Staff Writer Washington --
Leonard Robinson, president of the constituency-building National Summit On
Africa, released a plan of action February 29 listing recommendations to
U.S. policymakers in government and the legislature for strengthening trade
and cultural ties between the United States and the continent. Among the
recommendations cited in the draft "National Policy Plan of Action for
U.S.-African Relations in the 21st Century" were these: increased funding to
battle HIV/AIDS in Africa; U.S. support of a ban on landmines; an end to
sales of small arms to the continent; more financial aid for African
refugees and raising the immigration limit for African refugees; increased
support for peacekeeping training and missions to Africa; and immediate
passage of the trade bill, the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA).
Robinson, a former deputy assistant secretary of state under President
George Bush, told journalists at a National Press Club briefing that the
draft document, which runs to 100 pages, is "an attempt to guide and form
U.S. policy toward Africa." He said it was approved by more than 2,300
delegates from all 50 states after a process that included six regional
summits and the recent four-day National Summit on Africa meeting in
Washington, which President Clinton addressed. The Summit, which Robinson
said "far exceeded our expectations," was established in 1996 with funding
from the Ford and Carnegie foundations. The series of forums in six
different cities involved 15,000 participants discussing U.S.-African
relations in more than 50 workshops. Robinson said that between 30 percent
and 35 percent of the participants were Africans living in the United
States. Six-thousand five hundred delegates and observers took part in the
culminating February 17-20 meeting, which featured Kenyan President Daniel
arap Moi. "We found out that there are a lot of people in America who care
about Africa," Robinson said, adding that "the challenge now is to capture
and maintain that enthusiasm" so that the recommendations made in the policy
plan of action can be implemented. He noted that a final, polished version
of the draft will be completed, printed, and sent out within three weeks.
Raising Africa's visibility in America is "not going to happen overnight,"
Robinson acknowledged. But "the Summit is dedicated to educating Americans
about the importance of maintaining a strong and healthy U.S.-African
relationship" and will do so by "going into primary and secondary schools
and using the Internet," he said. Recognizing that "it is premature to say
the Summit is going to be a permanent institution," Robinson said plans were
to hold a large national Summit meeting, similar to the culminating meeting
in Washington, every two years. "The mayor of Denver, Colorado, has already
put in a bid to host the second summit and most likely it would be held
during the month of February, which is Black History Month" in America, he
said. He added that he would also like to sponsor an annual report to the
nation on the status of U.S-African relations. Asked if funding from
foundations or other sources had been offered for the future, Robinson said,
"The Summit generated enough credibility so that funding will step forward.
This will become clearer in the next month." The draft plan of action
includes 239 recommendations which address a wide range of issues from trade
to human rights. With that in mind, measures the U.S. government should
undertake to strengthen U.S.-African ties, it says, include the following:
-- convening the major world powers and African nations for an international
conference on African reconstruction and reparations, in effect instituting
a Marshall Plan for Africa that would at least increase U.S. aid to the
continent by a budget equivalent of 0.7 percent of gross national product;
-- liberalizing the requirements for business visas for Africans to
facilitate business travel to the United States; -- establishing an African
economic development commission to review and evaluate implementation and
performance of African development. It should include Africans living in the
United States, African-Americans, African diplomats, and U.S. government
representatives; -- making U.S. foreign assistance programs, trade
benefits, and security assistance available on a "preferential basis to
those countries that implement policies that are respectful of human
rights"; -- having returned Peace Corps volunteers assist with teaching
Americans more about Africa; -- offering "a public apology to the people of
Africa and the Diaspora for its participation in the capture and abduction
of African people from their homeland"; -- taking an active role in
discouraging U.S. tobacco companies and industries from marketing tobacco
products such as cigarettes to children in all African countries; --
increasing support for UNIFEM (United Nations Development Fund for Women);
-- supporting the case for a permanent African seat on the U.N. Security
Council; -- promoting protection of intellectual property rights of African
countries, communities, inventors, and businesses; and -- working with the
European Union towards strengthening and fostering self-determination and
sovereignty on the continent, "especially in French-speaking Africa." In
addition, the document recommends that the U.S. government ratify or support
the following treaties, acts, and conventions: the Basel Treaty, the
Convention on Biological Diversity and the Convention on Desertification,
the Bamako Convention, the Rio Conference Treaty, the Kyoto Accord, the
Treaty to Ban Landmines, Habitat II, and the Fourth U.N. World Conference on
Women. (The Washington File is a product of the Office of International
Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: usinfo.state.gov)
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