African union elects first president

By ALEX DUVAL SMITH in Maputo

In a move that will boost African ambitions to achieve greater stature on the world stage, the continent has elected its first ever president.

Alpha Oumar Konare from Mali will serve for four years as president of the 52-nation African Union. But cocooned by 44 other African heads of state meeting in the Mozambican capital, Maputo, President Robert Mugabe once again escaped censure for his government's human rights record.

Zimbabwe is not on the agenda of the summit. Apart from electing Konare, who is highly respected both in Washington and Paris, the African Union still showed signs of carrying with it some of the baggage of its predecessor, the cosy dictators' club which for 39 years was known as the Organisation for African Unity.

The leaders of the continent faced a stern ticking off from United Nations secretary general Kofi Annan. He told the 45 African heads of state that they should not endlessly look to the rich world for solutions to their problems.

He called for "African responsibility" and said "democracy means more than holding elections". He said that even though the European Union and the United States should dismantle trade barriers, it was up to African countries to create a healthy climate for "intra-regional trade".

With the almost unanimous election of Konare - a pragmatic choice, acceptable both to francophone and English-speaking Africa - the African Union once and for all put paid to the ambitions of the flamboyant Libyan leader, Colonel Muamar Gaddafi.

Last year, at the first AU summit in Durban, South Africa, he proposed himself as president of a continent devoid of its colonial national borders and defended by a single army.

But if it wishes to be modern and credible, the AU still carries with it some old ghosts. Street demonstrations have been banned in Maputo for the duration of the summit, and that includes attempts by the Zimbabwean opposition to stage a protest here.

Conflict resolution - as in the wars of Africa, especially the fighting in Liberia - is central to discussions here.

But most of the delegations are still hoping that President George W Bush will pull a rabbit out of his Texan cap when he arrives in Nigeria today.

Horst Koehler, managing director of the International Monetary Fund, addressed the heads of state yesterday and Romano Prodi, the European Commission president, will tomorrow offer a fund-raising package for a standing African peacekeeping force.

- INDEPENDENT