ABSTRACT
The African continent celebrated the 50th Anniversary of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), now the African Union (AU) in 2013. The continent’s leadership took advantage of this milestone to take stock of achievements and challenges besetting the continent. In the case of the former, the continent takes pride in the liberation of many countries from colonialism, curbing unconstitutional change of governments following an era of military coups, and the promotion of multiparty democracy through regular democratic elections. Furthermore, there is a reduction of political instability through peacekeeping initiatives under the Peace and Security Architecture (PSA), the introduction of the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM) as a voluntary self-assessment tool for the AU member states’ performance in democratic governance, and the formulation of a development framework – the New Economic Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD). Yet, Africa is still faced with many governance problems. For instance, the AU has had to respond to the ubiquitous violent conflict in the Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, and insurgencies in the Central African Republic, Egypt, Mali, and South Sudan. The continent has also had to deal with other problems such as poverty and HIV/AIDS, low literacy rate, and generally low level of access to education and health services (AU 2013).
