by SAVIOUS KWINIKA
Editor-In-Chief
JOHANNESBURG, (CAJ News) – GOOD governance is essential for peace and prosperity, South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa, said as the continent reels from a series of coups.
Ramaphosa’s sentiments coincide with his country’s two-year chairship of the African Peer Review Forum coming to an end.
He noted that following coups last year in Mali, Guinea and Sudan’s membership of the African Union (AU) were suspended.
Guinea Bissau also experienced a coup attempt.
“Last week, the AU also suspended Burkina Faso’s membership following a coup in the West African nation,” Ramaphosa added.
He quoted then- Ghana’s President Kwame Nkrumah, issuing a warning to Africa’s leaders at the founding of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), the precursor to the AU, in 1963.
“Our people supported us in our fight for independence because they believed that African governments could cure the ills of the past,” Nkrumah said.
“… if now that we are independent we allow the same conditions to exist that existed in colonial days, all the resentment which overthrew colonialism will be mobilised against us.”
Ramaphosa said South Africa shared a responsibility, alongside sister countries, to strengthen good governance in the African continent.
“After all, good governance brings investment, development, peace, progress and, ultimately, shared prosperity,” Ramaphosa said.
South Africa is hailed as a model of democracy in Africa.
It is however beset by rising political tensions.
– CAJ News