DON'T MISS : Talking Africa Podcast - Gates Foundation CEO: 'Stop stockpiling & deploy vaccines to Africa to avoid costly new variants'

Not your parents’ international system

Africa: Will multilateralism triumph over nationalism?

By The Africa Report
Posted on Thursday, 25 February 2021 17:59

AfCFTA signing - Gabriel Dusabe -//CHINENOUVELLE_CnynysE000067_20180322_TPPFN0A001/Credit:CHINE NOUVELLE/SIPA/1803220915

It has been tempting to count the international order out. With nationalism the de facto route to political power for so many of the world’s powerhouse economies, many view multilateral organisations with suspicion.

The World Trade Organisation? The tip of the spear in the conspiracy to steal US jobs. The World Health Organisation? A pawn in a sinister game by a former Microsoft executive to track the general public via microchips injected under the pretext of a ‘vaccine’. Why not just track people using mobile phones like everyone else?

The WHO quickly became a punching bag in the US-China breakdown. And US President Trump tried to put sticks into the wheels of the WTO, blocking the election of Nigeria’s talented former finance minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala as director-general. Trump also tried to block the re-­election of Akinwumi Adesina as head of the African Development Bank.

Digital subscription
Digital subscription

Give yourself a headstart:
Get full access to The Africa Report on all your devices.

More Politics

1st-time novelist wins big

Osvalde Lewat wins the Pan-African Literature Prize with ‘Les Aquatiques’

In her first novel, the documentary filmmaker and photographer Osvalde Lewat attacks social conventions. The Pan-African Literature prize - newly ... created by the DRC’s President and the African Union’s Chairperson Félix Tshisekedi, and accompanied by $30,000 – will be awarded to her in February in Addis Ababa at the next African Union heads of state summit. I had a chance to meet her shortly before she will receive this award.