The Interface Between Article 4(h) of the Constitutive Act and the African People’s Agency: The Role of the AU in Post-Pandemic African Diplomacy

The pandemic which is sweeping across the globe has ushered in a new epoch in Africa which makes it imperative for the African Union (AU) to revisit its strategies and agenda in relation to the protection of the people’s sovereignty, understood in the context of protecting humanity in the continent. First, African dependence on the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines by the producers has exposed a clear conflictual dichotomy between unilateral (read national) and multilateral diplomacy, with the former, that is, the manufacturers of the vaccine dictating the distribution of the products. Specifically, the pandemic has revealed to Africa that reliance on multilateral diplomacy to address critical emergency situations to save the continent’s humanity is, to say the least, clouded with uncertainties. Secondly, the unwillingness of some of the member states to adhere to AU’s COVID-19 directives undermines the role of the continental organization, particularly with respect to the protection of humanity in the continent. Article 4(h) empowers the AU to intervene in a member state to protect the African people. In other words, the AU needs to revisit its role which is inscribed in Article 4(h) of the Constitutive Act to protect the African people’s agency. This study will proceed from the premise that the AU remained ambivalent and did not meaningfully invoke its role to protect the African people’s agency, the key ontological operational conceptual unit.