On the 6th of February, most of you received from CIDO the Decisions and Declarations of the 20th African Union Summit that took place from the 21st to the 28th of January, 2013 (including the ministerial meeting) at the African Union headquarters in Addis Ababa.  I thought it was a great gesture on the part of CIDO, so I decided to devote time to read the two documents.  Others had read them too, and the surprising thing that people noticed was the lack of mention of the "Role of the Media" or an expansion of the "Role of the Diaspora." Well, I said to myself I am not the only one who noticed that.  We found the omissions rather disquieting, and I was on the verge of penning a note to CIDO and the Chairperson to inquire how these two important parts of the engine that moves the Union could be forgotten.

The people in Addis must have been reading my mind because imagine my surprise when I opened my email on Monday, February 18, only to see an invitation from the Chairperson's office inviting me to a Communications Strategy Workshop in Addis Ababa from March 2-4, and all I had to do was furnish some information and I would get my ticket. I said oh oh here we go again, because I vividly remember the debacle that occurred with the Global African Diaspora Summit last year in South Africa, where you didn't receive your ticket until the last minute.  But here, another surprise: Thursday morning, my booking is in my inbox.  Well, everything I requested has gone accordingly.  Well, it would seem that there is a new sheriff in town in Addis Ababa.  People are already telling me that this is a workshop that the AUC needs badly to hold.

Of course, I don't know the theme of the workshop, but there is no doubt that Africa, vis-a-vis the African Union, needs a lot of rebranding.  Africa cannot continue to be known as the continent of negatives; we need to be known for the growth potential of the continent, where the growth rate is exceeding 7% annually, where dictators are on the run, where democracy is beginning to thrive with opposition parties ousting governing parties, and where in many countries the judiciary is beginning to fulfill their oaths of office. 

But this rebranding must he done through the African/Black media.  Despite the billions that African governments have spent contracting white firms, we are no farther away from the perception of Africa as the continent to be disrespected and dumped upon.  We are no farther away from all the negative adjectives that are used to describe Africa.  If you are wearing a pair of uncomfortable shoes, you are the only person who knows where it pinches you and you fix it.  Of course, when we are talking about rebranding Africa, we are talking about how the world perceives the continent; we are talking about what the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) or CNN, and other media in any of the developed capitals write about or sees Africa. 

What we don't realize is that it has taken years of painstaking hard work and the support of their people for these companies to reach the level that they are in a position to influence world views about how we are defined.  Any rebranding of Africa that does not employ or ignores the African/Black media will not succeed.  It really astonishes when African leaders come to places like New York, Washington, DC, London or Paris, and doesn't find the same time that they find to meet with the black media as they do with the mainstream media, because you know what, the public relations companies that they employ are all white.  So could these people really think of scheduling a meeting with the black media?  Every time, we see African governments advertise abroad, it is always with the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Time Maghazine.  But they are basically for business purposes, as if our communities, the Global African Diaspora, abhors business opportunities in Africa.

I am certainly looking forward to attending the workshop, and I know it would definitely be productive.  Yes, I know you would say that I wrote the same thing about going to Cairo, Egypt in 2005 about the establishment of the Pan-African Radio and Television Channel.  But you forget that there is a new sheriff in town in Addis Ababa.   Of course, I will definitely keep you informed.

By the way, don't fail to listen to my broadcast, "StraightTalk with Chika Onyeani on the AllAfricaRadio/SunuAfrik", on WPAT-AM 930 - www.wpat930am.com at 12 midnight ET, which is already 7 am Addis Ababa time.  Yes, "StraightTalk with Chika Onyeani on the AllAfricaRadio," the most powerful voice for Africa in America. It is our 8th year of broadcasting.

Chika A. Onyeani Publisher/Editor-in-Chief African Sun Times: www.africansuntimes.com Host: All Africa Radio: www.allafricaradio.com Tel.: 973-675-9919 Fax: 973-675-5704 Cell: 917-279-4038

"It is not what you call me, but what I answer to, that matters most" - Capitalist Nigger: The Road to Success, Onyeani's internationally acclaimed No. 1 bestselling book.

Have you bought Onyeani's new blockbuster novel, The Broederbond Conspiracy, www.thebroederbondconspiracy.com? or www.theblackjamesbond.com, adapted by the San Francisco State University "to teach students how to write a spy novel."