| Greetings All! This was a very important meeting. It was an honor and a pleasure to be part of this event. REPORT FROM THE RECENT AU UN GATHERING OF THE AFRICAN DIASPORA By Yao Khepra the Evolutionary aka Yao Khepra Wilson 6th Region Diaspora Caucus/SRDC - New York Co-Facilitator For all those African descendants who consider themselves 21st century Pan Africans, the life-blood for our moving forward is network communications. Representatives of the African Diasporan community who are elected, designated or self-appointed must accept the responsibility and obligation to present reports and summary information to the community on meetings and gatherings they attend that affect Africa and the Diaspora. Such representatives cannot hoard such information as if it belongs to each of them individually, nor should they present organizationally chauvinistic reports that feature only their groups when others were also involved in relevant proceedings. The African Diaspora must organize itself, and all 21st century Pan Africans must do whatever we can to promote and advocate that objective. Network communications and mutually respectful engagements are minimal requirements to achieve that objective. --------PADU - SRDC, 2010 *This is one attendee's perspective. There have already been two published reports, one from an attendee and the other from a third party non-participant. You are invited to compare and to combine all of the perspectives to get a full picture of the proceedings. I especially invite those organizations that attended to give their unique perspective of what went on in those two days to hep paint a picture for those who were not present. You can utilize the forum http://padu-srdc.ning.com/forum/topics/initial-african-diaspora-task at the PADU Coalition website if you choose to do so, or some other vehicle. EVENT: The African Union through its office at the UN (Ambassador Tete Antonio, Permanent Observer of the African Union to the United Nations), invited several organizations representing the African Diaspora to a meeting titled, "Building Bridges Across the Atlantic", on Thursday, October 21 and Friday, October 22, 2010 at the African Union Hall in Manhattan, New York. The published agenda for that meeting and the list of invited attendees is attached. The contact information for each attending organization is not listed, since I did not receive permission from them to do so. AU DECISION-MAKERS PRESENT: Ambassador Tete Antonio, Permanent Observer of the African Union to the United Nations whose staff at the African Union Hall served as host for the meeting. Ambassador Amina Salum Ali, Ambassador of the African Union to the United States, Washington, DC. Ambassador and Permanent Representative of the Republic of Malawi Mr. Brian Bowler Dr. Jinmi Adisa, Diaspora Director of the African Union Commission {Citizens and Diaspora Direcotrate (CIDO)} Mr. Anthony Okara, Deputy Chief of Staff of the Bureau of the Deputy Chairperson Dr. Fareed Arthur, Advisor (Strategic Matters, Bureau of the Deputy Chairperson of the Commision) Mr. Wuyi Omitoogun (Expert, Diaspora Relations, CIDO) MS. Nadia Roguiai (Expert, ECOSOC, CIDO) AFRICAN DIASPORAN GROUPS PRESENT: From the placards for the organizations invited, there were 36 slots, with approximately 15-20 African Diaspora organizations actually present for the two days, with a total of 35 individuals representing those organizations, all from the USA. Virtually all of those organizations present and invited were from groups headquartered east of Chicago, and mostly from the North East of the U.S.A. As one of the invited organizations, I was there in an official capacity as an organizational representative of the SRDC/6th Region Diaspora Caucus, and I was also one of the unofficial representatives of PADU/Pan African Diaspora Union Coalition of organizations that was present. Attached is a copy of the sign in roster of the 36 organizations expected to attend. Organizations in attendance as I personally recall were: African Unity of Harlem Youth Icons African Cultural Exchange Club December 12 Movement African Sun Times Falou Foundation The Drammeh Institute African Poetry Theatre Inc. Cameroon Organization World African Diaspora Union Gulla Geechee Nation The Africa Channel Saga Africa 6th Region Diaspora Caucus/SRDC IMPORTANT POINTS MADE AT THE GATHERING 1. Dr. Jinmi Adisa, Diaspora Director of the African Union Commission (Citizens And Diaspora Directorate (CIDO)--- ' More disturbing still is that there is some competition for power and influence within the Diaspora communities......... There are some elements of the Diaspora within the US that wish to assume the natural leadership of the Diaspora agenda and to organize and centralize the Diaspora effort.' 'There is a great need to maximize multimedia to combat the negative portrayal of the Africa. (explicitly the African continent and implicitly the African Diaspora) ' The Town Hall method for organizing the Diaspora has been successful in the U.S.A. but will the Town Hall method have similar success outside the U.S.A. in other parts of the Diaspora???' Dr. Adisa's presentation in it's entirety can be found at 2. Ambassador Bowler, Permanent Representative of the Republic of Malawi, passionately stressed the immediate need for a skills database of talents and resources in the African Diaspora. Currently, Africa has no way of knowing who. to reach out to in the Diaspora who possess the skills and qualifications to be of assistance. 3. Ambassador Ali reiterated a point she has made at other such gatherings: the African Diaspora should no longer merely wait for directions from the AU on organizing itself--the Diaspora should move aggressively forward in that regard. 4. There was a 5-6 person African Task Force elected by the attendees to work for 3 months as a pre-Summit Diaspora Group to meet South African organizers of the upcoming Diaspora Summit Conference which has been re-scheduled now for 2011 (originally scheduled for November, 2008 but postponed for internal South African political reasons). The Task Force is supposed to present reports to Ambassador Ali. It was mentioned that there will be other such task forces within the Diaspora assigned to other projects, each with a three-month existence, but the process of determining those was not determined at this gathering. There was also a big controversy/discussion about the lack of full participation by the USA African Diaspora at this gathering, since many of them were not contacted. 5. Dr. Adisa knowing the importance of African Union ECOSOCC to the Diaspora, called upon an attendee to specifically ask questions regarding ECOSOCC for all attendees to hear. However, the questions remained unanswered due to a lack of time. The questions that were asked and more detailed information as to why African Union ECOSOCC is an important component in organizing the Diaspora is open for discussion @ http://padu-srdc.ning.com/forum/topics/importance-of-au-ecosocc-in |
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